“There’s more, but I don’t know who they all are.”
“How many in all?”
“I … I don’t know … fifteen, maybe twenty.”
Slaton heard a siren in the distance. It was time to go. He pointed the pistol squarely between the man’s eyes and spoke slowly. “Itzaak, tell them the kidon is going to find them. I will find them all!” Slaton safed the Beretta, dragged the man to his feet, and threw him into a neat row of shrubbery. He was about to get in the car when he remembered the girl. He looked at her directly.
It was a stare that instantly mobilized Christine. She got up and broke into a run toward the office.
Slaton bolted, taking an angle to cut her off. She slid to a stop in front of him as Slaton put his hands out, palms forward, trying to appear less threatening.
“You have to come with me,” he said.
She shook her head violently, “No!” she pleaded, “No more!”
Slaton saw she wasn’t going to go easily. “I don’t have time to negotiate here.”
He grabbed an arm and pulled her roughly over to the BMW, shoving her inside and across to the passenger seat. Slaton got in, slammed the car into gear, and flew out of the parking lot. Cocking his head to the mirror, he saw blue pulsating lights. He had half a mile to work with.
Slaton drove wildly for two blocks, took a right turn, two lefts, then stopped abruptly. He got out, pulling Christine along, and hurried ahead to the next street where the Peugeot was parked. He put her in and started driving again, this time moving quickly, but with more control. Ten minutes later, the small town of Penzance faded away behind them. Slaton eased to a normal speed and began thinking about his next step.
They drove for an hour, winding across deserted country roads. Slaton made turns without ever referencing a map. He had come up with three preplanned avenues of egress. The first ran east on the A30 — fast, but highly visible. The second took him east along a series of less traveled secondary roads. The last was a westerly route, to the isolation of Land’s End. It was something no one would expect, and definitely reserved as a last-ditch jink to get clear, since doing so would severely limit his subsequent options.
Leaving Penzance, Slaton decided the police would find the BMW quickly. But he was reasonably confident that no one had seen them switch to the rented Peugeot. They had managed an anonymous departure from the chaos, and so he’d selected the second route, hoping to avoid detection while still heading in the right direction.
Slaton eyed his passenger. She seemed to be in shock, curled up against the door with a distant, glazed expression. It was a look he’d seen before, in many different scenarios — battlefields, prisons, hospitals. All the places where trauma tore at the human mind and body. It usually didn’t bother him.
“I’m sorry about shoving you around back there,” he offered. “I didn’t have time to explain things.”
She didn’t move or speak.
“I said I’m sorry,” he repeated.
She looked at him this time. “Sorry?” she whispered. “Again, you’re sorry?” Without warning she lunged at him and started swinging, a flurry of fists that nearly caused Slaton to veer off the road. He struggled to stop the car while being beaten about the head and shoulders. Her swings were wild, but a blow landed painfully on his jaw and he recognized the salty tang of blood in his mouth. She continued to lash out as the car came to rest on the shoulder of the road. Slaton did his best to fend off the barrage but did nothing to stop her. Eventually she slowed, then finally stopped, the tantrum having run its course.
“Sorry for what?” she yelled. “For killing that man back there? Or the others you’ve killed? How many have there been?”
He said nothing.
“Why can’t you just stay away from me?” She flung out another fist that glanced off his shoulder.
He looked at her impassively, a trickle of blood at the corner of his mouth.
“Are you done yet?”
“No!” She shouted, tears now streaming down her cheeks.
“I came back because I realized those two men, or someone like them, would come after you.”
Christine laughed, “Oh right, you came to rescue me.”
“No. I came to find them. I knew they’d track you down, so I found out where you were staying, and then waited.”
Her eyes narrowed as she tried to understand. “What would they want with me? Who are they? Or perhaps I should say, who were they?”
“I only killed one of them,” he said distractedly, studying the rear-view mirror, “and that was an accident.”
“Oh, it was an accident that you kicked him in the face so hard you broke his neck. I suppose it’s okay then.”
“It happens.”
“Not where I live it doesn’t!”
He shot back, “And what do you suppose they had in mind for you if I hadn’t come along?”
Christine had no reply. She drew back to her corner, pressing against the door.
“This is crazy,” she finally said. “Two men I’ve never seen before in my life, asking me questions and trying to pass themselves off as police. When I figure out that they’re lying, they want to kill me. Only then I’m saved by … by yet another recurring lunatic.”
She looked at him, her eyes pleading for some simple explanation. Slaton offered nothing.
“So now you’re my hero?” she said. “Returning the favor from when I pulled you out of the Atlantic? Somehow I don’t feel like we’re even. If I hadn’t found you, I’d be a thousand miles from here, halfway to New Haven by now. My biggest worry would be whether I wanted a can of beans or a can of hash for lunch. Instead, I’ve got strangers chasing me around a foreign country, threatening me. And the local police think I’m psychotic.”
“Look, you saved my life and I am grateful. I wish you hadn’t been pulled into all this. But I can’t change it now.”
“You wish I hadn’t been pulled into it?” she asked incredulously. “You hijacked my boat! You … you killed someone and then forced me into a car at gunpoint!”
“There was no time to explain back at the hotel. I had to get you out of there. It wasn’t safe.”
“And now I’m safe?”
“No, you’re not,” he said. “At least not yet.”
He gauged her pensively, deciding how far to go.
“Look, I won’t keep you against your will. But let me explain a few things first.” He saw her eyes drop to the gun in his lap, forgotten in the fury of her assault. Slaton tucked it carefully under the seat, a show of goodwill. As he straightened, the sound of an engine announced a car approaching from behind. His eyes went to the mirror, his hands to the steering wheel and gearshift. A few moments later the car whisked by at speed. It disappeared around the curve ahead. He looked at her again. She seemed less tense.
“You could have bolted out and screamed for help from that car. You didn’t.”
“I’m glad you put that gun away,” she said with some consolation. “But you still haven’t told me who those men were. You knew them. You called one by name … Itzaak.”
“That’s very good — that you can remember details under stress. Most people can’t. Who did they say they were when you let them into your room?”
“They told me they were investigators with a branch of the British government. Maritime Investigations or something. They called themselves Bennett and Harding.”
“And they had IDs, although you didn’t look at them closely.”
She looked embarrassed. “They seemed professional enough.”
“One was Itzaak Simon. The other I don’t know by name, but I’ve seen him before. Both are assigned to the Israeli Embassy in London. Itzaak is the designated Assistant Attaché for Cultural Affairs. They’re both full-time Mossad Officers, Israeli intelligence.”