“Would you like to see the wine list now, sir?”
“I’m thinking a bottle of champagne with dinner, so you can chill one up. You choose a nice vintage. Our friends will be here shortly.”
“Very good, sir,” the waiter said, and disappeared. The man hadn’t mentioned price. That usually meant a good tip was on the way.
Beth sipped the purple wine and sat the glass down carefully. “Janna is with Excalibur and Lucky is FBI, right?”
“Yeah. She’s a piece of work, just like you. She was Lucky’s partner and a really good special agent when I stole her. Lucky was an eight-year-old kid in Mogadishu when I was in Somalia, way back in the day. I sort of adopted him and his grandmother, and got them to the U.S. They settled in Minneapolis, and he made a name for himself playing basketball, excelled in college, and then again with the FBI.”
“How will I recognize them? I’m nervous about this.”
“Trust me. That will not be a problem. Did you have a good workout?”
That brought a smile to the glum face. “Three-mile run. Met up with that personal trainer you arranged at the gym, and she ground me down to get an analysis and set a program to ‘build up my core’—whatever that means. When can I start shooting?”
“Soon. Ah!” Kyle looked toward the entrance as Janna stepped inside.
“My God, she’s gorgeous. And big!”
Janna was dressed in a creamy silk blouse, a long black skirt slit on the side to show maximum leg, and black leather boots with heels. Over her shoulder was slung a bag large enough to carry a cannon, which it did, an M-1911 .45-caliber Colt. Janna didn’t like small pistols. She waved and whispered to Lucky, who stepped beside her. “My God, she’s tiny! And Kyle wasn’t kidding about her beauty. Look at those cheekbones.”
Lucky Sharif was as dark as his wife was pale, and moved with a quiet sense of total confidence. As they walked to the table, they both swept the place with steely gazes — Janna doing the right side and Lucky doing the left. No threats. Kyle made the introductions, and Coastie extended her small pale hand to welcome them.
The waiter hurried over with the champagne bucket, uncorked the bottle, and poured generous glasses for them all. It took about thirty seconds for Janna and Beth to decide to become friends.
“I’m so sorry about the death of your husband,” Janna said, with her palm on Beth’s forearm. “It was a terrible thing.”
Coastie looked down. She hadn’t expected to find a real friend, and tears welled in her eyes. She dabbed them away. “Thank you. It has been hard to handle.”
“Then to absent friends and Colonel Francisco Miguel Castillo.” Lucky raised his glass in the traditional toast, and they clinked glasses. He didn’t ask for information because he had already been briefed on the incident. A real shit sandwich.
“Hey, look,” said Lucky, holding up his forearm and grinning. “My rich wife bought me a new watch this afternoon. Claims that her petty tyrant of a boss gave her a promotion.” He twisted the wrist so the Rolex caught the light.
Kyle said, “Another toast, then. To Janna, the new vice president of Excalibur Enterprises.” Glasses clinked again, and the mood lifted. He noticed a new gold-link necklace at Janna’s throat.
The waiter swept by and distributed menus, and by the second glass of champagne the food began to arrive: oysters and scallops and the best the Chesapeake Bay had to offer. Beth was feeling better, knowing that these three people were totally on her side. They all wore plastic bibs to catch the squirts and splashes of shellfish being dismembered. Laughs erupted, and when it was done the tone changed; coffee replaced wine, and Kyle got down to business.
“I leave for Afghanistan tomorrow, gang, which is the other reason for this meeting. What we say here does not go beyond this table. There’s a rogue agent, name of Nicky Marks, on the loose, and I’m going to find him.”
“The guy from Mexico?” Coastie was all attention. “Let me go with you.”
“Let me finish this, Coastie. I’m being partnered with a veteran CIA guy named Luke Gibson, who was with me in Berlin when the same dude threw a grenade at us. He knows the bad guy, and we’ll track him down.”
“So? Seems like a pretty straightforward deal now that you know who you’re hunting,” said Lucky, leaning back and listening carefully. “I know the FBI already has Marks as a high priority over here. He won’t last long.”
Kyle poured himself some more coffee. “That’s not why we’re here. It’s my partner, Gibson. I don’t really know him at all, other than what the agency has revealed, which isn’t much. Marty Atkins swears he’s a top gun, and I’m supposed to take that for granted. I don’t. I can’t.”
The other three caught it. “You want us to do an independent background check?” Janna asked.
“You got it. Everything from when and where he was born up to today. Don’t trust the CIA brief. Lucky, there might be a terrorist angle in this before all is said and done, so you can clear it with your boss to do a bit of independent fieldwork. Go see his parents’ headstones, check paper records, follow him as a kid. I want to know everything. The agency thinks highly of him, and I want to believe that. In fact, I really have no reason to think otherwise. Janna, you coordinate things and get one of our trusted computer guys on it.”
“What about me?” said Coastie softly.
“You’re not ready. But some news on that front, too. Our buddy Orville Oliver Dawkins is retired from the Marine Corps, but you know he can’t sit still.”
“I’m going to work with Double-Oh?” Beth felt a tingle of excitement. The former marine master gunnery sergeant had been her mentor in Task Force Trident.
“He’s up in Vermont, running a camp for veterans dealing with PTSD and drugs. He’ll help whip you into shape again. I want you to be my partner as soon as possible, Coastie. But right now you can help most by hanging with Double-Oh. Let him make the call on when you’re ready. The personal trainer can wait until you get back here. Deal?”
“Oh, yeah.” For the first time that evening, she actually smiled with genuine joy.
They left the restaurant together, and a pleasant wind along the waterfront closed around them with a smell of brine. This was no war zone but a stretch of the big city that had been renovated, gentrified, commercialized, and made safe over the years. Heavy crime remained on the far side of North Street, a planet away from the showcase extending from Harborplace to Fells Point.
Plenty of foot traffic roamed the area as Lucky and Kyle handed the valets the tickets to have the cars brought around. Girlish trills of laughter erupted from a clutch of teenagers taking selfies in odd contortions. Couples strolled the boulevard, lost in each other’s presence. A panhandler in droopy khaki pants, who hadn’t yet been moved out by security, approached them, shouting, “Hey, can you lend me twenty dollars for a hotel room?”
The four friends didn’t respond. The whiskered man moved a few steps closer, and Lucky growled, “Get lost. Nothing for you here.”
The man stopped and lit a cigarette, and the nicotine cloud joined the other smells. Urine. Beer. Grime. He gawked at them. “Rich bastards,” he squawked. “Gimme those wallets!” Then he made the move — an energetic dash that belied his original appearance — and dug into his jacket pocket.
Janna had her .45 out in a heartbeat, and backhanded the bum hard across the face, sending him sprawling on the gray concrete with a broken nose. When the attacker’s eyes cleared, he got to his knees and was kicked in the ribs by Lucky. After catching his breath, he looked up to see four people standing around him, all pointing guns at his head. Both men were showing badges. His own gun had been scooped up by Snow White.