And he was going to get one, anyway. Sooner or later.
So he stopped thinking, and came out of the chair so fast that Wilson couldn’t grab his gun quickly enough. Irina screamed, and a glass crashed to the floor as Burke plowed into the bigger man, driving him into the wall. The two men fell to the floor, wrestling. Burke had one arm around Wilson’s neck, and was punching him with the hand that held the cell phone. But he was no match for the Indian. The guy was just too strong.
Though Wilson was on the bottom, he got a hand on Burke’s neck and began to squeeze. Burke felt the air fly from his lungs, even as his thumb found the activator on the cell phone. He slammed the phone into Wilson’s neck and, in an instant, there was a staticky crackle, and Wilson began to go limp. Jesus Christ, Burke thought, it’s working! It’s actually –
Lights out.
When he came to, about five minutes later, he was sitting in one of the Adirondack chairs, bleeding from his good ear, which Irina had clobbered with the candelabra.
Wilson stood next to the transmitter. Irina was pointing the submachine gun at Burke, crying softly to herself. “Why is crazy man coming here?” she asked. “What does he want? Jack!”
Wilson shook his head, typing on the laptop. “He wants things to stay the way they are.”
“We call police, okay?” she asked.
“Well…”
“But he attacks you!”
“It doesn’t matter,” Wilson told her. Then he turned to Burke. “That was cute,” he said. “A real surprise.”
“Thanks,” Burke replied. He brought his hand away from his ear and stared at the blood on it.
Wilson returned his attention to the computer.
Then they heard it – a thwop thwop sound, outside the tower. They turned and looked, and saw it right away: a helicopter hovering about a hundred yards from the ranch house.
Burke couldn’t believe it. It could only be Kovalenko. Or someone sent by Kovalenko. He’d given the guy enough to figure it out. Once Culpeper and the courthouse got their attention, it wouldn’t have been all that hard for the Bureau to find Wilson and the B-Lazy-B. They certainly had the resources. So the cavalry had arrived.
Too late.
“They friends of yours?” Wilson asked.
Burke shook his head. He would have laughed, but there was too much at stake and, besides, he hurt too much.
“I don’t think the helicopter’s going to be a problem,” Wilson said, typing furiously. “In about a minute, it’s going down. Everything is.” He looked out the window. “Why are they at the house?”
“Because the guy who’s running the operation is an idiot, that’s why,” Burke explained.
Wilson nodded. “I’m not surprised.”
“Why is there helicopter?” Irina asked.
“It’s the police,” Wilson told her. “They’re coming to arrest Mr. Burke.”
“Good,” she said.
Wilson turned back to the laptop. In the distance, a bullhorn began to call his name. He shook his head.
“We should tell them where we are,” Irina said.
“In a minute,” Wilson replied.
“I thought you guys were in love,” Burke suggested.
Wilson paused, and turned to look at him.
“We are,” Irina insisted, proudly.
“What’s that got to do with you?” Wilson asked.
“Nothing, I guess, but… you’re gonna kill her with that thing,” Burke told him. “Seems like a helluva way to end a honeymoon.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about,” Wilson replied. “It’s not like a bomb.”
“I know,” Burke said. “But… she’s got a pacemaker.”
Wilson stared at him. Finally, he said, “What?”
“Irina. Has. A. Pacemaker.”
Wilson blinked a few times. Then he laughed. “Good try,” he said. “Full marks.”
But Irina started to cry. “And how you are knowing this?” she demanded. “This is my secret!” Her whimpers deepened into the soft sobs of a distraught child.
“ ’Rina?” Wilson went to her side, his voice so soft it was barely audible.
“I don’t want you to know,” she said, “I am damage goods. Is why I make love with you in dark. No way you see scar. Is ugly.” She wailed. “Now you’re not wanting me!”
A strange smile came to Wilson’s face. He gave an almost imperceptible shake of his head. Then he went to her, and crouched by her side. “Show me,” he said, taking the submachine gun from her.
She complied, sobbing in the way little kids do, taking shuddery breaths. She fumbled at the buttons to her blouse, and finally pulled it aside, baring the scar. Wilson ran his finger along the ridgeline of skin, then pressed his lips to it.
Burke felt like a voyeur. He turned away.
“I love you,” Wilson told her, his voice thick with emotion.
“I-” Her voice fell apart. The sobs came heavier.
“Shhhhh,” Wilson said. “I love you. I’ll always love you.”
In the corner of the room, a telephone rang. It was the last thing Burke expected to hear and the sound startled him.
Wilson kissed the top of Irina’s head and tried to dry her tears with his fingertips. Her weeping subsided. The phone continued to ring.
Finally, Wilson got to his feet. Burke couldn’t read the expression on his face. “It’s an extension from the house,” he said as he moved toward the ringing phone. He picked up the receiver. Listened. With a smile, he put the palm of his hand over the phone and turned to Burke. “Somebody named Kovalenko wants me to come out of the house with my hands in the air. He says he knows I’m in there.”
Burke didn’t know what to tell him.
Wilson said into the phone: “Give me a minute.” Then he hung up, and slowly crossed the room to the transmitter. Laying his fingertips on the laptop’s keyboard, he took a deep breath. And hesitated.
For a moment, it seemed to Burke that Wilson was screwing up his courage to derail the world. But that wasn’t it at all.
Wilson was sailing in a secret storm between one dream and another, tossed this way and that by the uncertainties of his own heart. Love and revenge waited in the darkness, sirens singing from the reefs surrounding his imagined Paradise. He’d risked everything, and it had come to this: Which reef would he wreck himself upon? Love… or Revenge?
Finally, he exhaled. Jerking the plug from the laptop, he closed the computer and gave it to Burke. “Don’t let them get this. It wouldn’t be good.”
Burke nodded.
“Get Irina out of here,” Wilson said. “Away from here, and away from the house. There’s a footpath behind the tower. It goes to the hot springs. She can show you the way.”
“No,” Irina cried. “I stay with you.”
Both Burke and Wilson ignored her. “And what do I do, once I’m there?” Burke asked.
“Get rid of the laptop,” Wilson said. “There are caves, and the one that’s farthest west has a cenote, about thirty feet inside the entrance.”
“A cenote?”
“A well. It’s actually a mine shaft. They used to mine silver here. Anyway, the well is a couple of hundred feet deep. So be careful. Way down, it’s filled with water. If you drop a rock in, and count to six, slowly, you’ll hear the splash. So toss the laptop in, and forget about it.”
Burke nodded. In truth, he wasn’t even sure he could walk. His ribs hurt, and his head was pounding. But he wasn’t going to argue. If Wilson was going to make a last stand, Burke didn’t want to be there for the finale.
“Irina, sweetheart. I want you to go with Mr. Burke,” Wilson said.
“No, no Jack,” she crooned. “Nooooo. I stay with you. I want-”
Wilson smiled teasingly. “Already? Just a week ago, you promised to obey. C’mon,” he cajoled, “you promised. Remember?”
Burke had no idea what was going through Irina’s mind, but suddenly, she stopped weeping. She nodded her head solemnly, and kissed Wilson on the lips. A long kiss that Wilson ended, drawing away, holding her face in his hands.