“But she will find out,” Dratshev said.
“Yes, Russian genius.”
“You want her to.”
“The president has to be prepared, for when the time comes.”
“When the time comes?”
“Were you listening at all while I outlined this operation? I honestly don’t know how someone who needs to be reminded to blink can be so successful.”
“I pay people to remind me.”
“Don’t get cocky. I can have your family wiped out before someone has the chance to remind you.”
After a long silence on the other end, Dratshev came back on the line, his voice much more subdued. “I also talked with Jack.”
TQ sat up and leaned forward, resting her elbows on the desk. “Yes?”
“She will see you.”
“You told her who I am?”
Dratshev hesitated. “Da.”
“I don’t recall asking you to do that.”
“You did not say I should not,” he hurriedly explained. “I told her you want to talk. That’s all.”
“What did she say?”
“She never says a lot. She said she does not know you and to give her your number.”
“So she wants my number,” TQ said, amused.
“Do you have a job for Jack?” he asked.
“You could say that.”
“She asks for big money, but she is good. She is the one who brought me Owens’s head. You know—the serial killer.”
TQ had read about the Headhunter being caught and killed in Vietnam a couple of years back. “They said the feds found him.”
“No,” Dratshev replied. “His ugly head is buried in my garden. She asked for three million, I gave her half in front.”
“Up front.”
“She never accepted the rest after she personally delivered his head.”
“I wonder why.”
Dratshev laughed. “Maybe because she liked killing him. She’s a very good killer and she can find anyone. You will be happy with her work.”
“Tell her to call me at 713-555-2457.”
“Good.”
“And get the president a television.”
“Da.”
TQ hung up and leaned back in her chair. So you’re that good, are you, Jack? Let’s see how long it’ll take to make you scream out my name for mercy.
Now she just needed a way to force Jack to come to her, and Dratshev might have given her some ammunition. The death of Walter Owens had been all over the news, and she recalled something about the leader of a Vietnamese skin-trade organization being captured in the same assault that had brought him down. Perhaps he could shed some light on Jack and her involvement.
TQ had good contacts all over Asia, particularly in prisons, because that’s where she procured many of her black-market human organs. She telephoned her primary contact in Saigon and asked him to personally visit the skin-trade chief. If the man could provide her with Jack’s Achilles’s heel, she had the means to make his confinement much more comfortable than it probably was.
*
Southwest of Baltimore, Maryland
Next morning, March 2
Elizabeth Thomas restlessly paced the perimeter of her comfortable but claustrophobic confinement, wishing like hell she knew what was going on in the outside world. Without a watch or window, she had to rely on the number of breakfasts served to measure how long she’d been here, and she knew more than a week had passed now since they’d abducted her in the elevator.
Cleanshaven had come to take away her breakfast tray some time ago, so it was probably mid-morning. Apparently they had decided to ignore, yet again, her pleas for a television or radio so she could keep up with what was going on and pass the long hours with something other than the books they’d given her, none of which could hold her interest.
Was the Secret Service having any luck tracking her down? Did they believe her dead? Had her kidnappers made ransom demands? And how and what was the vice president doing in her absence? She’d selected her running mate largely because, as a popular Southern governor, he could deliver the block of votes needed to win the election. He also, fortunately, supported much of her agenda, but not all of it. He’d been frank in opposing her health-care plan and energy-alternative initiative when they’d both been campaigning for the Democratic nomination. Would he use this opportunity to forestall some of her key directives?
She paused in her pacing and tensed when she heard the sound of the key in the lock. From her reckoning, it was much too early for lunch, the next time she would usually see one of her guards.
Cleanshaven stuck his masked face through the doorway and motioned for her to move to the farthest corner of the room.
She complied. “What’s happening?”
A few seconds later, Beard carried in a flat-screen television and set it up on a table opposite the bed. Cleanshaven plugged a cable from the wall into the back, while Beard handed her the remote.
“Thank you,” she said as she flicked the set on, eager to find out what was happening with the investigation into her kidnapping.
Without a channel guide, she had to flip past several sitcoms and soap operas before hitting any sort of news broadcast. A local TV channel was showing a live broadcast of a police chase. The video, taken by a news helicopter, tracked a stolen truck speeding along a highway, with several cruisers in pursuit. Though the report contained no relevant information about her abduction, she stayed tuned long enough to hear the station’s ID: WBAL. She was being held somewhere in, or near, Baltimore. Shocked that she was being held captive so near D.C., she viewed the development nonetheless as good news. Surely that would make it easier for authorities to find her.
She surfed some more channels and stopped when she hit CNN. They were in the middle of a sports wrap-up, showing highlights of last night’s NBA games. After a couple of minutes of clips, the sports anchor threw back to the news desk, where the anchor team teased some of the stories that would be reported at the top of the hour following the commerciaclass="underline" the latest on a massive, late-season snowstorm that had buried the Rockies, the search for a missing murder suspect in Philadelphia, and details about the Argentine president’s upcoming visit to the White House.
Thomas sat on the bed, puzzled, as a series of advertisements for laundry detergent, dog food, and diapers played out on the screen. Not only had she heard no mention of her abduction and the investigation to find her, but she also couldn’t imagine why the Argentine visit would be proceeding as scheduled.
Surely, she thought, she’d just missed some earlier update on the kidnapping. She got her answer ten minutes later, after sitting through the reports about the snowstorm and murder suspect.
“Argentine President Juan Carlos landed this morning at Andrews Air Force Base,” the anchor reported as video of Carlos emerging from his plane and being greeted by an American welcoming committee was shown on the screen. “His three-day visit to the nation’s capital will include a speech this afternoon before the U.S. House of Representatives and an evening reception at the Argentine embassy attended by key congressional and military leaders. President Carlos is seeking support for his initiative to hold joint military maneuvers with U.S. Forces this fall, among other issues. Tomorrow, he’ll be welcomed by an official state dinner, and the next day he will meet privately with President Thomas in a closed-door session at the White House.”
Thomas stared at the monitor, thoroughly confused.
The anchor came back on. “President Thomas will be spending the morning meeting with the joint chiefs of staff to get their reactions to the proposal,” he said. Video showing Elizabeth Thomas—at least she could have sworn it was her—started playing on the screen. “Yesterday, Thomas delighted a group of Australian and French tourists taking the White House tour with a surprise appearance as their guide led them through the Red Room. This video was provided by one of the Aussies, who said Thomas stayed for ten minutes to chat with the group, sign autographs, and pose for pictures.”