Ah well, in for a penny . . .
“You’re approaching this from the wrong position, all of you,” I said. Three heads turned slowly in my direction. I think I preferred it when their concentrated spite was focused on each other. I took a deep breath and kept going. “What do you all want to happen here?”
“I just want my daughter,” Krauss said, sounding close to tears.
“And I want my son,” Venko said, expressionless.
“I want the safe return of Heidi, and a guarantee of the future safety of my school and its remaining personnel,” Gilby said, with a narrowed glance at Venko which I ignored.
“OK,” I said carefully. “Well, as far as I can see none of these demands preclude any of the others. We know where we want to go. The question is, how do we get there with the least amount of blood being spilled?”
Venko suddenly switched on a big smile. “Bravo,” he said, all jolly as though his flash of steel was just an imagining. “You see, Major. All it needed was the logic of a woman.”
“Wonderful,” Gilby drawled acidly. “So, Miss Fox, how do you propose that we achieve these aims?”
I turned to Venko. “You leave now, and you pull your men out with you. You return here in twenty-four hours, with Heidi. By which time the Major will have retrieved the boy from wherever it is he’s got him stashed. You make the exchange and you leave. No tricks, no ambushes, no double-crosses. And no retribution.”
Silence followed the outlining of my plan. If I’m honest I hadn’t expected anything else. At least they didn’t laugh it straight out of court.
Venko smiled again, rather sadly this time, and shook his head a little. “Impossible,” he said. “You have good heart, Miss Fox, but what guarantee do I have that the Major will deliver my son?”
“He’ll deliver.” My chin came up. “On that you have my word.”
He regarded me, brooding, unconvinced.
“What’s your son called, Mr Venko?” I asked.
“Ivan,” he said, a father’s pride putting roll and drama into it. “His name is Ivan.”
I nodded. “And how old is Ivan?”
Venko hesitated before he answered, as though the question was some kind of a trick. “He is just twenty,” he said at last.
“I see,” I said, choosing my own words with care. “And how would you feel if Ivan never lived to be twenty-one because you couldn’t bring yourself to trust me?”
Venko stared at me again, as though his gaze alone could bore through the outer layers of skin and skull and lay my brains out on a slab looking for the dark cancerous stain of lies.
I forced myself not to flinch under the onslaught, just stood quiet with the Desert Eagle resting in my hands, and the Uzi hanging from my shoulder. Difficult to take the word of someone who forces you to listen to it at gunpoint, but Venko didn’t seem to mind.
Eventually, long after I’d given up hope, he favoured me with an austere smile. “Very well, Miss Fox, we will leave now and we will bring the girl here at ten o’clock tomorrow.” He stood, the cashmere coat closing around him with the silent floating grace of old-fashioned velvet theatre curtains after the last encore.
He moved out from behind the desk, not much taller than my own height, but twice as wide, and barrel-chested. I backed up as he came past me, kept my finger on the trigger as he waved his disgraced bodyguards to their feet with a brusque, “Come, we go.”
Sideburns would have liked to have made a bigger production out of getting to his feet, but a glance at his boss told him sympathy would not be forthcoming. In fact, staying as invisible as possible was his best chance for survival. He didn’t even have the courage to demand the return of his personalised gun.
Just as they reached the study doorway Venko halted and turned back, encompassing all of us in a visual sweep that singed where it touched. It finished up on me and I could feel it burning.
“Just remember, Miss Fox,” he said, sombre, “what I risk by trusting you. Yes, I will return the girl to her father, just as I wish to have my son returned to me. I will keep my side of this arrangement.” His voice roughened then, grew harsh with the emotion that vibrated through him.
“But let me promise you one thing,” he went on. “If anything happens to Ivan, I will raze this building to the ground and make it my life’s work to destroy you – all of you – and hunt down what is left of your families. I hope I do not regret making this bargain with you, Miss Fox.”
And with that cheery farewell he and his entourage stalked out of the study.
“So do I,” I murmured, watching them go. “So do I.”
Twenty-one
“Here,” the Major said, splashing a decent couple of fingers of brandy into a lead crystal tumbler and placing it into my trembling hands. “I think you need it.”
“Thanks,” I only managed to keep my voice steady with an effort. “I’d rather have a single malt, though, if you have it.”
“No,” he said. That familiar arrogant tone was back, but he almost smiled. “Drink what you’re given, madam.”
Venko had gone. His men had gone. Dieter had gone, too. He’d allowed the Major to lead him out of the study. I’d heard him protesting in staccato German all the way along the corridor.
I was left sitting in the chair Gilby had so recently vacated while he went to calm the staff and organise them into a makeshift security patrol. The ease with which Venko and his men had walked into the Manor and taken control of it had obviously galled. The instructors and pupils were all still down at the assault course. Run ragged, but oblivious. No doubt there would be time later to explain what had happened here to those of them who needed to know. I had a feeling Gilby wasn’t going to make this invasion common knowledge.
So I sat by myself in a room made more empty by the sudden absence of violent men, and tried to stop the cracks joining up and becoming tears. By the time he came back I’d more or less got them papered over enough to fool him. Maybe for a couple of seconds.
He closed the study door and looked at me for a while before moving over to the drinks’ cabinet. A long thorough inspection like I was a racehorse none of the pundits had fancied much, but who’d somehow put on an unexpected spurt at the finish.
Me, I felt like a racehorse who’d run out of their distance and damned near burst my lungs to do it. I was exhausted.
A loaded Desert Eagle weighed over four-and-a-half pounds. Holding the gun out and ready for that length of time had overstressed my biceps where they blended with the deltoid muscle at the front of my shoulders. With every movement I was aware of the stretched and torn fibres. Even lifting the glass was painful.
My sternum, which had been keeping a low profile, was throbbing like crazy. Breathing hurt. Sitting hurt. Now the adrenaline was slowly bleeding from my system I felt thoroughly second-hand.
The Major poured himself a brandy and took it to the other side of his desk. I’d put the Uzi and the hand cannon down onto the surface and he moved them aside with a frown of disapproval, like he was worried about scratches. Then he sat and looked at me some more.
A sudden thought rocked me. I sat up so fast I nearly slopped the contents of my glass into my lap.
“Major, please tell me that you do have Ivan to trade, don’t you?”
“Of course,” he said, not seeming in the least surprised by the question.
The relief had me nearly sagging back into my chair. “Where is he?”
“Somewhere close. Somewhere safe,” Gilby said, short, sharp. “Even my own men don’t know his location.” To his credit, he didn’t point out that I was considerably further down the chain of command and I didn’t press him. There would have been little point.