What difference did it make? A small mercy, like he said. I pulled my mobile out and tossed it to him.
“Thank you,” he said. He grimaced and flipped it open with his good hand.
If I was going to stop, I had to find a way to stop, a time and place to stop. I would have to make a decision to stop. The decision would carry risks, it was true. But so, always, would the alternative.
Maybe this was what Delilah had been talking about, when she told me about choices, and how I would make the right one.
Hilger was supporting himself on his left elbow, inputting his sister’s number with his left thumb. It embarrassed me to have to hear whatever he might say to her.
Yes, that was it. I’d been telling myself for so long I had no choice, that maybe my choice reflex had atrophied. But I could reawaken it. I could let him live. By walking away, I would prove that Dox and I were no threat to him. He’d have no incentive to come after us after that.
It made sense. I could do this. It was up to me. My choice. Everything would be possible. A thousand new directions. I thought about how I would tell Delilah, how she had been right, and how much her confidence had meant to me, how much it had helped me. I would tell her…
The phone! Not his sister, he’s detonating the bomb!
Without any other thought, I brought the gun up and shot him in the face. Again. Three times. He jerked and twitched and dropped the phone.
I sat there dumbly for a long moment in the sudden silence, the rain beating a steady drumbeat on my arms and shoulders. A tendril of smoke curled coyly from the muzzle of the gun.
I stood and picked up the mobile. I checked the screen. An access code, then 1, for America, 212, for New York…and six more digits. Christ, he’d been one digit away.
But was it the bomb? Or did he really have…
It didn’t matter. For all I knew, Boaz was elbow deep in the device right now. If Hilger had detonated it, Boaz would have died. Even if I was wrong, I had no choice.
The rain beat harder. And through the echo of that sodden drumbeat, I thought I heard a whispered voice, at once familiar and distant.
No choice.
I stood there in the cold and dark and rain. I’d known, at some level, of the possible danger if he made a call. But I’d let him make it anyway. Because once he had the phone in his hands, I had…
No choice.
My mobile buzzed. I looked and saw that it was Boaz.
I picked up. “You okay?” I asked.
“Did you hear a boom?”
“No, I didn’t. But I wasn’t listening closely.”
He laughed. “I have a simple rule. If there’s no boom, it’s good news.”
“You disarmed it.”
“Disarmed and disabled. We’ll need experts to handle the radioactive material and make sure it’s disposed of properly, but that’s someone else’s concern.”
I started walking toward the car. Jesus, I didn’t know I had so many places that could hurt. “Whose?” I asked.
“Let’s just say Mister Boezeman is very eager for no one ever to learn of this incident. And my organization is very eager to own a Rotterdam port official. It’s going to be a beautiful friendship.”
“You’re going to bring the organization in on this?”
“Of course. With results like these, a little-what do you call it, moonlighting?-is easily forgiven. But enough about me. I’m so relieved not to be blown into a million pieces that I’m forgetting to ask you about Hilger.”
“He’s dead.”
“How?”
“How do you think? Bullets.”
“And you’re okay? You’re not hurt, you’re out of danger?”
“I’m okay.”
“Fantastic! Naftali will be so pleased he might talk again. He was hoping to do it himself, but he’s a big boy, he understands that what matters is, it’s done.”
“Where are you?”
“On the train, on the way back to Amsterdam. Let’s have a beer. Debrief, decompress.”
“I’ve…got a lot to think about.”
“Bullshit. No one should be alone after something like this. Besides, you have our car and all our shiny toys. You have to give them back or we’ll get in trouble.”
I tried to smile, but I felt sick. “I’ll meet you at the station and give you the keys. But I can’t stay long.”
I PARKED NEAR Centraal Station, took my bag from the trunk, and locked the car. As I walked along one of the canals, I dropped Hilger’s gun over the side. I had left the USP in Vondelpark. I didn’t have time to search for it in the mud, but it was okay. I hadn’t even fired it, and if Boaz was using it, it must have been sterile.
I met them inside the station, as they came down the stairs from the Rotterdam train. Naftali shook my hand. “I owe you, Mister Rain,” he said.
“No, you don’t. You had my back. That’s good enough.”
He shook his head. “I know my brother was sent to kill you. I’m glad now he didn’t succeed.”
“Yeah, me too,” I said, and Naftali actually smiled.
“I told you he would be excited,” Boaz said.
I laughed weakly, then grimaced. My chest felt like I’d stopped a truck with it.
“Where will you go now?” Boaz asked. “To Delilah?”
I couldn’t have fooled him even if I’d been inclined. “Yeah.”
“I didn’t call her, you know. After Singapore. It was up to you.”
“Well, do you want me to go see her?” I said, handing him the car keys. “Or do you want to stand here talking?”
He laughed. I explained about the USP and told them where they could find the car, then went to the ticket booth to see about a train to Paris.
There was a nine o’clock that arrived at Paris Nord at one in the morning. I bought a ticket and headed to the platform. I called Kanezaki just before boarding the train.
“How is he?” I asked.
“He’s going to be okay. A lot of bruises, some fractured ribs, and a hell of a sunburn.”
Yeah, my skin was itching, too. I’d been so busy I hadn’t noticed until now.
“Good.”
“How about you?” he asked. “Did…”
“You were right about everything. And everything we came here to do, we did, including rendering our friend defunct. I’ll post the details. But you can probably reach the Israelis on their mobiles right now.”
“I may do that.”
“You did well, Tom.”
“And you did good.”
“Well, no good deed goes unpunished. I’ll be in touch, okay?”
“I hope so.”
I took my seat on the train and five minutes later, we pulled out of the station. I was wet and shivering from crawling through Vondelpark, and my chest ached. I just wanted to get somewhere warm and dry, somewhere I could close my eyes.
I leaned my head against the window. As we left the lights of the city behind and the world outside grew darker, my reflection appeared in the glass.
For so long, I’d been asking myself whether I had a choice, and always answering no. But maybe the real question was why I never had a choice. Why I always put myself in a position where I had no alternative but killing.
What was that saying of Henry Ford’s? “You can have any color you like, as long as it’s black.”
I thought I heard the iceman: You can have any choice you want, as long as it’s mine.
Maybe. But I’d made at least one right choice, in New York when I’d walked away from Midori’s boyfriend. And maybe I was making another right now, in going to Delilah.
I thought about those three small words she had uttered, the ones I didn’t know how to respond to. I’d think of something, maybe even what she had called “the traditional response,” although the thought of it scared me. I had told her I needed her to guide me back, and staring at that ghostly image in the glass, I knew I did need her, that without her I would just give up and surrender to the iceman. It would be so easy. I was used to it. A part of me even wanted it.