The sign at the coffee shop said it was closed, due to open soon, the fourth Starbucks in Buenos Aires. Windows were covered in newspapers. Guarding the door was Shotgun. He had one of the sawed-off shotguns in his hands, two nines tucked inside in the waist of his pants.
I said, “Shotgun.”
“Look like you been through hell.”
“In the middle of hell and standing in the heat.”
He was out of his suit and had on jeans, Lugz, and a dark sweater. His clothes matched the casual dress of the neighborhood, were better for the frigid temperature outside. It was just as cold inside the building. No heat. Our breath fogged with the damp, chilling air. The coffee shop was two levels, but it wasn’t large, not like the Starbucks in the U.S. Downstairs had enough seating for about ten people, upstairs probably had the same close quarters.
Shotgun dug into his back pocket and took out a small package, tossed it to me.
It was a blue-and-white package of BC Powder.
He said, “Looks like you need that.”
“A man after my own heart.”
I opened the BC Powder, downed it dry, hoped it took the express lanes to my pains.
Shotgun said, “Everybody was getting worried about you.”
“They’re worried about the package, not me.”
“Well, I was getting worried about you, homie. So was the boss man. He didn’t say he was, but the way he was pacing and talking in Russian, I knew his blood pressure was up.”
“You did a good job back there. Real good.”
“Told you I’d been working out. Best shape of my life.”
“Real good job. He was about to draw down on us. And he didn’t give a shit about Arizona being knocked up. He would’ve shot us dead right there and vanished in the crowd.”
He nodded. “What happened after we got the pregnant woman from down there?”
“Got ugly. Shootout. Mass hysteria. People died.”
“Bad guys are the ones that died, I hope.”
I shook my head. Shotgun had called them bad guys. Like people did when they saw things in shades of black and white, in good and evil. We were all bad guys.
I said, “The other one . . . the one who was leading them . . . he got away.”
“How?”
I licked my lips and said, “Temporarily.”
He nodded.
I said, “They have on bulletproof vests. Might be bulletproof clothes. I shot him twice. Bullets bounced off him like he was Superman. So assume they are all wearing the same gear.”
“I saw the killer woman. She had on all black and was soaking wet. She walked right by me and hurried to the other train. Her face . . . her face . . . it was pretty, but it wasn’t pretty. She’s an easy one to spot. She had a lot of marks on her face. Like she had . . . been in an explosion.”
I took to the stairs.
My body ached, and I kept that pain hidden the best I could as I ran up one level. Shotgun knew I was hurting; he didn’t know how bad. I didn’t need to become the weak link. My bags were upstairs. Nothing inside the bags but clothes. No time to clean up. But I changed clothes. Put on jeans. My hands were numb from being damp in the winter air. And being inside a building that didn’t have heat wasn’t helping the numbness in my fingers subside.
Konstantin and Arizona were upstairs.
No sign of Scamz. That meant he was with the other team.
I went to Konstantin.
He said, “Son, they need to remain mobile.”
I nodded. “I need so say something.”
“Speak.”
“I think . . . I think Midnight is alive.”
“Your father?”
It felt stupid to say that. I knew what I’d seen and I still wasn’t sure.
I went over that day in my mind. Not in a coherent way. Not in a logical way. I had no time for logic. Flashes came and went. That day in North Carolina. It was a puzzle I didn’t have time to solve. He was alive. If he saw me before I saw him, he would leave me suffering from lead poisoning. And now he used the name Medianoche. He was one of The Four Horsemen.
That was what I told Konstantin. I’d cut to the chase, said my old man wasn’t dead. I told him that the man I’d been told was my father was my enemy. Had always been my enemy.
Konstantin put his hand on my shoulder. He did that to calm me down.
He said, “How sure are you?”
“I’m not sure about anything anymore. But I shot him twice.”
“So he’s wounded or dead.”
“Neither.”
“What happened?”
“Bullets bounced off his Italian suit. Kevlar. Saw the bullets fall. Saw him get up.”
The Russian assassin paused.
I nodded.
He said, “That means he has a South American tailor and spares no expenses.”
I nodded.
He asked, “You want to get off this job?”
“No. As far as I’m concerned, he’s nothing to me. He just tried to kill me, and I returned the favor. He’s nothing to me and I’m nothing to him. This is my debt. I’m not walking away from a promise. I’m seeing this through. But I wouldn’t be hurt if you and Shotgun left at this point.”
“You’re favoring your right leg.”
“Never been better.”
“Talk to your employer. She’s being difficult. I almost walked away. We’ve been here thirty minutes and that is thirty minutes too long. We need to move. Not a time to rest.”
“So you’re not leaving.”
“You’re stuck with me, kid.”
Several laptops were up and running. Looked like a scaled-down version of Jack Bauer’s Counter Terrorist Unit, here in Buenos Aires to safeguard the world from radical threats.
Arizona was in front of the laptops, two satellite phones at her side. The black briefcase that everyone on the opposing team was willing to kill for, her MacGuffin, was near her feet. Never left her side. She saw me and stopped typing, put her hand on her swollen stomach and stood up. For a moment I saw softness, a flash of worry that turned to relief in her eyes. In that moment I had flashes of us when we were at Chapel Hill and the Carolina Inn. I saw her naked, giving herself to me. Her swollen belly reminded me that those disturbing flashes had no value. That momentary flash of us as lovers deepened my anxiety and negative feelings.
I told Arizona, “We can’t stay here.”
“I know. I’m pulling up footage from the street cameras around the city. Want to find the BMW the Horsemen used, see if we can run the cameras backward.”
“We don’t have time for you to play with Google Earth.”
“Linking into government satellites. Bouncing signal. Will only take a minute.”
“We don’t have another minute.”
“The BMW that trailed us, trying to reverse-engineer and see where the car originated. Find their Batcave. And we have a screen up, can see what’s outside and on the streets.”
“Are you fucking deaf? You need to be mobile until we get a handle on this. They use flash and bang. They’re military. Hiding behind a closed door and windows covered in paper means nothing. Not a damn thing. They could have infrared heat sensors aimed at us right now. They could pinpoint all of us and start shooting at us like we’re sitting ducks.”
“Back the fuck off. I’m trying to get some idea of where their base is.”
I asked her where the rest of her team was, asked if that other half of the package had been located. I was ready to switch from being hunted to becoming the hunter.
Sierra and her brother were in one of the vehicles, moving around the city and the province, out driving around and doing their best to get a fix on the other package.
She said, “They’re close. When they get a better fix, they will contact me.”
“If they aren’t killed. If they get spotted, they’re dead.”
My words sent a noticeable chill down Arizona’s spine. She actually cared about someone other than herself. Her siblings were armed, but they needed skills that went beyond ramming people with cars. Toe to toe, they wouldn’t be a match for a trained assassin, let alone mercenaries. They were grifters. They were knives going to a fight where grenades are used.
My eyes went to the briefcase Arizona guarded with her life. A piece of a puzzle she was risking to sacrifice her siblings and her unborn baby to protect. I needed that package. I wanted them to come after me. I wanted Midnight to come after me. I needed this headache to end.
I said, “I need everything you have on one of The Horsemen. Medianoche.”
“We have nothing more than what I have already given you and the Russian.”
I wiped sweat and leftover grit from my face, then went to the window, peeped out at the street.
Arizona stayed on task, breaking into government Web sites, directing satellites until the area outside came in as clear as a hi-def movie. She zoomed on one laptop. On another she had a six-block radius. On another she had the footage she was looking for. The BMW that had trailed us. Arizona had my angst level up as she tried to find out where the BMW had come from.
Arizona told me, “You left me vulnerable.”
“You were covered by my team.”
“An old man and a giant who used to be a second-rate boxer.”
“A seasoned assassin and an ambitious man you shouldn’t take for granted.”
“I’m paying you to cover me. I hired
you
. Not them.”
“Keep your lies straight. Scamz hired me.”
“Technicality.”
“Talk to him if you have a problem with the way I work.”
“I’m talking to you.”
“After a year. You pop up with this bullshit.”
“Gideon . . .”
“And they are working with me. You don’t get to call the shots.”
“I’ve never worked with either of them before.”
“And they’ve never worked with you. First time for everything.”
“You left me vulnerable. You stayed on the train and left me vulnerable.”
I said, “Now would be a good time to decide how bad you and your team want this.”
“You were flown down in a Gulfstream. Draw your own conclusions.”
“You see what you’re up against. You’ve seen the footage. They are hot on you. You could leave now. You could vanish and they would never be able to find you and your team.”
“Why didn’t you leave Retiro with us? You had time to get off the train with me.”
“Had to make sure someone was . . . had to see if someone was still alive.”
Arizona thought I was talking about the merc they had called Rodríguez.
I said, “Give me the goddamn package. You’re wobbling and slow. I don’t need your swollen feet slowing me down. This isn’t like London. You and Scamz and your crew should—”
“The package stays with me.”
“You think we’ll take your half, find a way to get the other half and vanish?”
“Nothing surprises me.”
“Glad I know where we stand. You’re right. Me and you together, that was no good.”
“We were never together. Not the way you see it in your mind.”
“Good. So keep it professional and I’ll do the same.”
“Gideon.”
“Yes, Queen Scamz?”
She took a breath that told me she was irritated, stressed, and sleep deprived. “Gideon, at the risk of sounding redundant, the package stays with me. It will not leave my care.”
I rubbed my temples, then said, “Okay, Queen Scamz, get what you have to get so we can get out of here.”
“Stop calling me that.”
“That’s your handle. That’s your goddamn handle.”
“You’re scared?”
“I’m half past scared and you should be a quarter to terrified. The longer we stay here, the more dangerous it is for my team.”
She snapped, “Look. Let me finish what I’m—”
“Last time, shut it down.”
“Well, Gideon, you’ll want to see this before I shut it down.”
I leaned in, my eyes on the computer screen.
Photos of me.
My blackmailer had sent the information, only the phone I had didn’t vibrate.
Ten pages of information.
Information my old enemy in Detroit had bought.
What I saw was worth what he was asking for.
Capítulo 37
un soldado se murió hoy
The Four Horsemen
had become three.
Rain fell, and lightning lit up the sky as Medianoche sat with his angry mercenaries.
He knew it would be like this.
In war, when a comrade had fallen, the adrenaline rush always washed over everything logical, the call for revenge a trumpet that blared loud enough to terrify the deaf.
Once again, all were dressed in black Italian suits. Black fedoras. Black overcoats.
They were at The Beast’s apartment. Laying low. Too many dead bodies in the street.
Everything from Puerto Madero to Retiro to Palermo was dangerous, the Argentine police trying to make sense of the early-morning killing spree that had left no suspects.
Sensor in one hand, gun in the other, Medianoche stood next to The Beast.
Señor Rodríguez was dead. Someone’s son. Someone’s brother.
He was dead. Killed by Gideon.
The boy who claimed to be Medianoche’s son. A lie Medianoche would never believe.
The Beast said, “Señor Rodríguez was twenty-four years old.”
Señorita Raven vented, “His body was left on a train like he was a used Coke bottle. There was no dignity in his death. He died a hero. He died protecting Medianoche. Señor Rodríguez deserved better than to be left on a fucking train heading to the ends of nowhere.”
Medianoche glanced at Señorita Raven, saw a young soldier who was fuming, hyped, pacing back and forth, a loaded nine in each hand. She needed revenge on behalf of a fallen comrade. She’d seen her fellow soldiers lured into ambushes, walk into booby traps, had seen comrades blown to bits, lose limbs in explosions. She had almost been blown up herself, the explosion filling her face and body with shrapnel.
The Beast said, “How many were there?”