He retrieved her dress from the floor and draped it carefully across the back of the chair. What would it be like to come home every evening to this woman, he asked himself. This intelligent, fiery, beautiful woman? It would never be dull. Never boring.
Whoa, Toad. You’ve never thought like that about a woman before. And this is just a one-night stand. One hell of a one-night stand, but that’s all it is. She’s a lonely woman in a strange city and you just happened to get the nod for stud service. She probably still thinks you’re a jerk. She’ll walk away in the morning without looking back.
He was holding the drapes apart and looking out the window when he heard her stir.
“What time is it?”
“About four-thirty.”
“Come back to bed, lover. There’s still some night left.”
She captured him in her arms. She smelled of pungent woman and sleep. Her skin was soft, yielding over hard muscle, warm and sleek. She drew him in as if she had waited for years for his tension and power and desire, as if she had searched and hungered all her life just for him.
When he next awoke the sunlight was leaking through the drapes. He sat up in bed and looked around. Judith was gone.
She had gathered her clothes and tiptoed out while he slept. Oh, he had done that very thing himself — how many times? He had slept in their beds and escaped just as the sun rose. He had fled from the soft, scented sheets and the photos on the dresser and the frilly curtains on the windows. He had stepped over the panties and bra lying on the floor and never glanced back.
He could see himself in the mirror over the dresser. He needed a shave. The bed still smelled of her. The room was as empty as his life.
17
Qazi was seated on the terrace of the villa drinking orange juice when Yasim joined him and placed several envelopes of black-and-white photographs on the table. Qazi examined them in the morning sunlight. He had had four hours sleep and felt sluggish. This close to an operation, it was difficult to get to sleep, so he had taken a pill, the effects of which had not yet worn off.
The photographs were of people near the helicopters. Qazi sorted them into piles: the shots of each person were stacked separately. When he finished he had nine stacks. “Nine people yesterday, eh, Yasim?”
“Yes, Colonel. And one helicopter flew for two and a half hours. Here are the photographs of the pilots and their passengers.” Yasim laid another group of pictures on the glass table.
Qazi carefully examined each picture. Yasim refilled his glass with orange juice. “There is a storm coming, Colonel.”
“When?” Qazi did not look up from the photos.
“Rising seas and winds this evening. Frontal passage at four A.M. local tomorrow.”
“Terrific. And Ali thinks nothing can go wrong.”
“Do we postpone?”
“We can’t. Not after last night.” He continued to study the pictures. “The same people who have been there for two weeks, on and off,” he said at last.
“No known agents,” Yasim agreed. “The pictures from the backup site will be ready in an hour.”
“And no one has been followed to or from the helicopters?”
“No one.”
“No tails that you have seen?”
“That is correct.” Yasim frowned. He knew as well as Qazi did how difficult it would be to detect a major tailing operation. “We have taken every precaution.”
“Ummm. When does the crate go aboard the ship?”
“The supply barge is tied alongside already. It should be aboard any time.”
“No problems at the quay this morning?”
“They took the crate just as we had arranged.”
Qazi had a difficult decision to make, one he had purposefully been avoiding. He had hoped these photos would help him make it. The primary helicopters had been identified by Pagliacci, who had arranged for the bribery of the watchman and the transport-company manager. And Pagliacci, Qazi was forced to assume, had told the GRU all about it. Yet no Soviet agents had been seen to visit the site in two weeks, or so it appeared. And Pagliacci had said he had just told Simonov last night. If the GRU intended to thwart Ali’s departure tonight, they were being extremely circumspect.
On the other hand, Qazi had kept Pagliacci in the dark about dates. The vans were hired for another two weeks. The villa had been rented for three months. The ship-painting contractor thought his scow was going to be used tomorrow and the day after. And the airport surveillance project was moving along nicely, with lots of Pagliacci’s Mafia soldiers involved, costing lots of El Hakim’s money and cocaine. Of course, Simonov would have suspected the airport project was a red herring, but only if he were told everything Pagliacci knew. And Pagliacci had dribbled the information out, squeezing rubles out of the Russian for every crumb.
So it was probable — no, certain — that Simonov did not have the big picture when he died last night. But had he already made preparations to act on the information he did have? Certainly the GRU should be checking the helicopters and hangar area if the Soviets intended to act.
Finally, there were the backup helicopters, about which Pagliacci had known nothing because he had not been told and because no Italian or NATO soldier had been bribed or pumped for information. These machines were parked on the concrete mat at Armed Forces South, the NATO base. Ali would literally have to hijack the machines, which might or might not be fueled, which might or might not be airworthy. These machines were guarded. So there would be shooting, and higher authority would be immediately alerted. The success of Qazi’s scheme depended upon keeping the American admirals and generals in the dark until he had the weapons removed from the United States. He wanted them to see a fait accompli, not an operation in progress. Yet if the Soviets appear tonight at the primary helicopter site, that would be checkmate.
Qazi thought the problem through yet another time as Yasim replaced the photos in their envelopes. Unless something else came up, he decided, he would still go with the primary helicopters.
“Go back to the hotel and monitor the wiretaps carefully this afternoon. If the Americans are warned, they will try to get their men aboard the ship and get underway. I’ll be in to see you this evening. We’ll sanitize the suite then.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Assume you are being followed.”
Yasim picked up all the photos and went into the house, a large two-story with almost twenty rooms.
There were no certainties in this business, Qazi reminded himself. You felt your way blindly, aware that nothing was ever as it appeared, aware that every action was fraught with hazard, both real and imaginary. And the longer you played the game, the more real the imaginary dangers became. The irony was that you never knew whether or not you had already made the hard, inescapable, fatal mistake.
“Good morning, Colonel.” Noora sank into a chair beside him. She was wearing slacks and high heels, and had her hair pinned in a bun on the back of her head.
“Is Jarvis sleeping?”
“Yes.”
“What did he eat when he arrived last night?” The two of them had arrived in Rome yesterday evening on a commercial flight. A heavily sedated Jarvis in a wheelchair and Noora in attendance wearing a nurse’s uniform had passed through customs and left the airport in an ambulance, which had driven them for five hours to the villa.
“He has not yet eaten. I gave him a shot to counteract the sedative three hours ago. He should be waking soon. I will see that he eats.”
“After he has eaten, have him unpack the trigger and inspect it. It’s still in the crate in the garage. You and Ali should supervise him. We will repack the trigger tonight.”
Noora nodded.