The Assassins Part 17

"So together they had the whole financial picture," Judd said.

Eva nodded. "Six a.s.sa.s.sins. Six financiers. Six dead financiers."

"You've nailed it," Bosa said. "Each of us took out one financier. That left Saddam as the only person to know the location of every piece of his wealth."

"They did one h.e.l.l of a job hiding it," Eva said. "As I recall, even after Saddam was toppled, the U.S. government could find only a few billion dollars."

"Right again," Bosa said. "Somewhere between forty and seventy billion dollars are still missing. Saddam's family, bankers, and governments have been searching for years. It's turned into the biggest-and quietest-treasure hunt the world has ever seen."

"I wonder where all of it is?" Eva mused.

"Not in one place," Judd said. "It's probably still spread around. Imagine the power of the person who finds the various hidey-holes."

The pilot's voice sounded on the cabin speakers: "The ambulance is waiting at the airport. Prepare for landing."

"We'll be back," Eva told Bosa.

With her in the lead, she and Judd returned aft. Tucker was as they had left him, motionless, an oxygen mask on his face and an IV in his arm. They strapped themselves in. There was a light jolt and a sense of drag on the plane. The wheels were down.

Eva reached for Tucker's hand. It was warm but limp.

Judd leaned close to him. "This is just sayonara until the next time, old friend. We'll miss you in Marrakech."

Eva looked out the window as the plane stopped. "We've arrived, Tucker. There's a staircase rolling toward us. Your ambulance is waiting." She smiled at him as if his eyes were open and he could see how much she cared for him. She had to try one last time: "Tucker, flex your hand. Please."

A tendril of cold air touched her cheek. She peered down the aisle and saw Jack had opened the craft's door.

Judd saw it, too. "We don't have much time. The paramedics will come for him soon." He took Tucker's other hand.

Eva leaned close, her lips almost touching the old spymaster's ear. "You've been shot in the head. Do something-anything-we're asking. It'll mean you can still think, understand speech, and move on purpose. Come on, Tucker, you need to know for yourself."

"I'm going to squeeze your hand again, Tucker. Then you squeeze mine." Judd compressed it.

They waited.

"Did I feel something, Tucker?" Eva asked, excited.

Very slowly the index finger of Tucker's left hand straightened, held a second, and collapsed.

Eva closed her eyes. "Thank G.o.d."

Judd heaved a sigh of relief. "Congratulations, you old SOB!"

42.

Aloft, on the way to Marrakech, Morocco Climbing to 27,000 feet, the Carnivore's trijet approached America's coastline. Judd watched out the window as the winking lights of civilization ended and the black Atlantic Ocean spread before them. The only sound was the muted strum of the craft's engines. He was alone in the cabin with Eva: Bosa was in the galley with Doug, while Jack and George were in the c.o.c.kpit, the door closed.

Eva was resting her head back against her seat. She looked tired, but then all of them were. It had been a long day.

"I'm puzzled, Judd." She sat up, folded her hands in her lap, and peered down at them. "You told me you couldn't be with me because you hadn't liked what you'd become in Iraq and needed a different life for yourself-different from all of the reminders you'd have with me. But just a few hours ago, you killed Chapman and two of his guards when they weren't a threat to us-at least for the moment. Are you happy you did it?"

"Happy isn't the word I'd use. I'd say a weight was lifted from me. It was as if time stopped. The noise receded. I felt at peace."

"I don't like the sound of that. Peace."

"If it's any comfort, it was a cold peace, almost as if I was removed from the world. Why won't you look at me?"

She lifted her head. "Four months ago you told me you didn't want to kill again, and now you've just erased Chapman. That was personal, right?"

He frowned. "If he'd had the chance, he would've killed us. I traded his life for ours. Doing Chapman was necessary."

She hesitated. Then: "Do you have flashbacks about the black work you were doing in Iraq and Pakistan?"

"No. Why?"

"If you had them, would you tell me?"

"Of course," he said. "Sure."

Her expression said she did not believe him.

Then he understood and felt a pain close to his heart: "You're afraid of me. You're afraid I'll hurt you."

Her expression was unforgiving. "I didn't know you'd done clean-up work in Iraq," she reminded him. "You waited until I'd fallen in love with you to tell me. That was bad enough. Now you say you found a 'cold peace' wiping Chapman. You felt 'removed from the world.'"

"Eva, please. Those were just my emotions in a very special set of circ.u.mstances. They're not who I am. Certainly not the way I think about you. I'd never hurt you."

When she said nothing, he changed the subject. "How do you feel about being kicked out of the CIA?"

"Terrible. My career as an intelligence officer ended before it could begin. And I hate that it looks as if it's my fault. How do you feel about it?"

"Relieved. You're free now." He wanted to tell her he loved her, to hold her in his arms again. He took a deep breath. "Do you at least trust me enough to work with me again?"

She seemed to think about it. "We were a good team last time," she decided.

It was a start. "Then we'll keep it at that. Partners. Nothing personal."

43.

Marrakech, Morocco Francesca Fabiano had come to Marrakech again, drawn back by a dream of something she could not name, something good. Pyotr Azarov told her he did not trust dreams, but she forgave him. She knew dreams had power, especially when one paid attention.

When she had explained it to him, he had listened attentively, his gaze sober.

"You're better off using your brain than your emotions," he advised. "You have a good brain, you know."

It had all begun yesterday morning. As usual she had left her hotel on Avenue Ha.s.san II and walked to the intersection with rue Mauritania. Both streets were a madhouse, with unm.u.f.flered cars and trucks, whining mopeds, and the occasional bellowing camel.

She waited at the curb for the traffic to stop. Near her, a young couple linked arms. Then a man carrying an English version of a Marrakech guidebook arrived and stood between her and the couple. He glanced at her and smiled.

She felt something s.h.i.+ft inside her. Something wonderful. It was not just his good looks, although he was a striking figure with a shock of black hair silvered at the temples and a strong chin shadowed by a little vacation beard growth. His sungla.s.ses were black as sin. Perhaps six feet tall, he gave off a feeling of athleticism in his beige slacks, open-neck white s.h.i.+rt, and st.u.r.dy leather sandals. He was probably in his fifties. She had just turned forty. Not an impossible age difference. He wore no wedding band.

Keeping her expression neutral, she looked away. There were many good-looking men on holiday in Marrakech. She would never see him again.

She focused on the bedlam in the street. A donkey was pulling a cart of vegetables down Ha.s.san. It was staying close to the sidewalk to avoid the worst of the traffic. But then a pickup swerved, and a taxi driver leaned on his horn. The donkey's ears lay back and he bolted, his hoofs pounding the pavement, the cart swaying, the driver's face turning beet red as he yelled in Arabic and tried to control the animal.

Francesca jumped back and stumbled. Pytor caught her. That was Marrakech for you, she thought later. Where else would you meet a handsome man and fall in l.u.s.t because of a freaked-out donkey?

"Are you all right?" He had a warm voice.

His arm was still around her back, supporting her. Each of his hands held one of her arms. They were firm, strong hands.

"I'm fine," she said. "Thank you. That was quick of you."

He smiled, and this time she smiled back.

"That's me," he said. "Speedy Gonzales. You know about Speedy?" When she shook her head, he explained, "He's a cartoon mouse. The fastest mouse in all Mexico."

She liked him. And she liked that he was concerned about her. She taught kindergarten in Portland, Maine, where female kindergarten teachers tended to marry early and well. Apparently some men-the kind with jobs and a future-had fantasies about them, which made the profession a slam dunk for women who wanted marriage. But she had not.

The stranger was holding her a little longer than he needed to, she realized.

"You're trembling." His forehead furrowed. "You could've been hurt. You need to sit down and relax. Let's go to that outdoor cafe." Releasing her, he gestured. "That's where I'm staying-the Hotel Fas.h.i.+on."

"I'm staying there, too." Wow. "You saved my life. My name is Francesca Fabiano."

"I'm Pyotr. Pyotr Azarov." He spelled the first name. "You p.r.o.nounce it 'Peter,' though."

"Russian?"

"Cossack, from the Ukraine." He was built like a Cossack, with the very good shoulders, the broad chest, and the long athletic legs bred to tame wild horses.

They sat at a small round table and ordered caffe lattes and hot croissants. They slathered the croissants with b.u.t.ter and jam then looked at each other and laughed, surprised each had wanted the same breakfast.

Pyotr drank his latte. "Imagine that, a blond Italian from Maine."

"My people came from Milan, in northern Italy," she lied. "There are a lot of blondes and redheads there." Self-consciously she ran her fingers through her short hair, pus.h.i.+ng it behind her ears. It was so pale it looked bleached white. She had a heart-shaped face, too, and a nose that turned up at the end.

"Yes, I remember that now." He studied her. "It's strange, but I feel we've met before."

"Impossible. But I wish we had."

Francesca and Pyotr took one of the s.h.i.+ny green caleches-horse-drawn carriages-to Marjorelle Gardens, the former home of Yves Saint Laurent. They strolled along shady paths, enjoying the vibrantly blooming trees and flowers.

He kept glancing at her. "Do you realize you're beautiful? I have a feeling you don't know that."

Surprised, she looked away. "Thank you."

"You're here alone?" he wondered.

"Yes. I've traveled here five times now," she said. "My mother worked here for a couple of years back in the eighties." That was her biological mother, not the good-hearted woman in Maine who had ended up raising her and who she told the world was her mother.

"Did she work in the airport duty-free shop?" he asked casually.

She felt her eyes widen with surprise. "How did you know?"

"Oh," he said airily, "that's just one of the jobs Americans did back then in an outpost like Marrakech."

44.

As night approached, Francesca and Pyotr took a taxi to Place Djemaa el-Fna, Marrakech's outdoor marketplace, and hurried into Chez Chegrouni and upstairs. The aroma of couscous made Francesca salivate. On the roof terrace, they chose a table at the railing where the view across the teeming market was panoramic.

"I've been told Djemaa el-Fna is Africa's largest marketplace," he said.

She inhaled. "It's an amphetamine rush to the senses."

As they ate traditional tajine slow-cooked stew, the sun set in a tangerine glow. "You really grew up in Maine?" Pyotr asked curiously. "I know this is crazy, but there was a woman I once knew named Roza Levinchev. It was a long time ago, and I was a young man, but I'll never forget her."

Francesca could hardly swallow. Her mind was in turmoil. She busied herself with her food.

"Our families were living in a little city called Bedford," he went on. "As it turns out, almost every state in the United States has a town called Bedford. Anyway, this Bedford was in the southern part of the old Soviet Union, near the Baltic. It was never on any map. Probably still isn't. Do you know what I'm talking about?"

She widened her eyes. "No. That doesn't make sense. Why would a Soviet city be named Bedford?"

He set down his fork. "We bought our groceries at Safeway, got ice cream cones at Dairy Queen, and ate quarter-pounders at McDonald's. I was a bachelor so I lived at home. My mother watched As the World Turns on TV. My father and I read The New York Times and the Financial Times-they were on our doorstep every morning. We spoke America's version of English. Our teachers taught us American history, American music, American literature." He looked around for eavesdroppers. "Bedford was a first-cla.s.s school for Soviet spies, sleepers, and moles."

It was her turn to set down her fork. "Who are you?" She stared at his handsome face, at his lying Cossack eyes. The s.h.i.+t had been wooing not her, but her past.

"I think you're Roza's daughter-Katia. You don't remember me at all, do you? Well, it's no surprise. You must've been eight or ten then. It was a long time ago, and I've had several cosmetic surgeries. Your mother was a star student, but you probably know that. As I recall, you and your mother got a.s.signed to Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C. Later I heard she was in Marrakech, working in the duty-free store, but what she was really doing was helping to move arms, ammo, and explosives with the PLO. The PLO did a lot of dirty work for us in those days." He gave her a compa.s.sionate look. "It must've been terrible for you to lose her. It sounds as if she set up some kind of situation in Maine to take care of you while she was gone. I heard her remains were found in her car at the bottom of a cliff in the Atlas Mountains. If it's any comfort, we were sure she didn't kill herself. She must've been burned, and the CIA took her out."