End Game Read online

  “Wow, that’s all heady and philosophical and—”

  “Kim, what’re you trying to say?” asked Valentina.

  “I’m saying I don’t like this. I’m saying that maybe Nathan was on to something when he asked Moreau why we were picked for this job. Maybe they didn’t want operators with more experience because we’re not supposed to capture Sam.”

  “Oh, don’t give me that BS,” said Ames. “We’re new. We’re unconventional. We’re unpredictable. That’s why we got picked.”

  “I have to agree with that,” said Hansen. “But it does worry me that Fisher confided in Boutin and the man turned on him so quickly.”

  “Maybe they trusted each other, but Fisher screwed him over somehow, and he turned,” said Valentina.

  Hansen sighed. “That’s a possibility.”

  “Sam went to the forger because he knew the guy would talk. He wants us to come to France,” said Gillespie.

  “Oh, yeah?” asked Ames. “Why? So you can sleep with him again?”

  Everyone fell silent. Valentina blinked. A mental switch was thrown. And suddenly she burst from her seat and threw herself on the little bastard, wrapping her fingers around his throat. “Haven’t you had enough with that mouth? Haven’t you had enough!”

  Hands dropped onto her shoulders and wrenched her away from Ames, who panted and cried, “I’m just getting started, baby!” He cocked a thumb over his shoulder at Gillespie. “You don’t see her getting all upset. Why? Because it’s a fact! Maybe we ought to get that out in the open right here!”

  Gillespie lowered her gaze and shook her head. “You bastard.”

  Ames pushed himself up and turned to Gillespie. “They need to know—because you could compromise this mission.”

  “I don’t want to go there,” snapped Hansen. But then he glanced up at Gillespie. “But did you go there?”

  “Tell him, Kim. We don’t have a choice,” said Ames. “She slept with him. She’s got feelings for him.”

  “I don’t have feelings,” cried Gillespie.

  “Kim, you really slept with him?” asked Valentina.

  Gillespie moaned through a sigh. “I’m an idiot, okay? It was months after he trained me. He was in a bad place, and I took advantage of that. He didn’t want to … but I … I just … I don’t know what happened.”

  Hansen pursed his lips, thought for a moment, then swore under his breath. “When we get to Paris, Kim, you stay on the plane. You’ll fly back. I’ll tell Grim. We can’t have you here.”

  “Don’t do that, Ben. I’m telling you, this whole thing is bigger than we think. They put me here for a reason… . They put all of us here. And I’ll promise you, right here and right now, that if it comes down to it, that if I have to kill him, I will. I’ll do it.”

  “I’m unconvinced,” said Ames. “Me, on the other hand, I’d whack him in a heartbeat. I never liked the bastard. He was a crappy teacher, and he’s got the weirdest sense of humor.”

  “A team of rookies, and a woman personally involved with the target,” Hansen began through a groan. “Like sending hamsters after a rattlesnake.”

  “I am a special- forces operator,” said Noboru, his tone steely. “I am nothing else.”

  “We’re happy for you, Bruce,” said Ames. “Now, shut the hell up and let us figure out what to do with the slut back here.”

  This time it was Gillespie who was ready to strangle Ames, but he slipped back into his seat and said, “I’m just kidding! I’m kidding!”

  Gillespie swore at him and looked to Hansen for help.

  “Who’s got the terrible sense of humor?” Valentina asked Ames. “And you know something? I’ve been dealing with guys like you all my life. You wind up miserable and alone.”

  “Not really. I wind up on a private jet, with a hot blonde, drinking champagne.” He winked.

  Hansen hardened his voice. “Ames, I’ve had enough of you, too.”

  “I’m just here for your entertainment pleasure—since you’re not here for mine.”

  Hansen snorted. “Show’s over. Back to work. Now, we’re going to go see this guy Boutin. Maybe Fisher’s paid him a visit.”

  “Ben, if Fisher is as good as everyone says he is, he may be long gone,” said Noboru. “Maybe all we can do is follow his trail. Maybe he’s not even in France anymore.”

  “Good point. Why would he stick around?”

  Valentina thought about that. “Maybe there’s something he needs to do. Someone he’s waiting for?”

  “Like us,” said Hansen. “Why do I get the feeling that we’re being baited?”

  “Still no word from Grim?” asked Valentina.

  Hansen shook his head.

  “Look, guys, stop worrying,” said Ames. “Like I said before, I’ve got some ideas for overwatch on Boutin’s place. Let’s talk about those, catch a few z’s, then wake up and have breakfast in Paris.”

  Valentina took a deep breath and folded her arms over her chest. “What makes you so confident?”

  “I’m more excited than anything else,” answered Ames. “We take down Fisher and we’ve really done something. We’ll be the guys who brought in the traitor. Then his legend becomes ours… .”

  Chapter 15.

  GRAND HOTEL TEMPLIERS REIMS, FRANCE

  THE flight to Paris took about six hours, and Reims was exactly six hours ahead of Baltimore, so while the team seemingly arrived at Paris-Charles de Gaulle International Airport at midnight their time, it was 6:21 A.M. by the local clock. Between yawns and the rubbing of red eyes, they rented a blue Opel and a green Renault and drove to the east side of Reims, to the Grand Hotel Templiers, where the agency had already booked two rooms. The five-story hotel was on rue des Templiers, a narrow street lined on both sides by subcompact cars. The place was about a ten-minute drive from Boutin’s apartment, affording them enough distance for security yet reasonable proximity to the target.

  Much to Hansen’s chagrin, Ames decided he was bunking with Valentina, who drove her heel into the short operative’s foot, and that was the end of that. Ladies in one room, men in the other, thank you. When would that guy ever let up?>

  Hansen stared through the window at a courtyard whose landscape swept outward like a chessboard, its walkways cutting at right angles through perfect squares of sod and trees. The image was fitting, as the game was, indeed, afoot.

  He wrung his hands and checked his watch. He and Ames decided that after breakfast they would reconnoiter Boutin’s place to be sure there wasn’t anything surprising they hadn’t seen on the maps. They would do a hasty drive-by, as Hansen felt certain that Fisher, if he was still in Reims, would be keeping a close eye on the forger. Hansen decided, though, that they wouldn’t make their move on Boutin until 11:00 P.M. at the earliest, when they could be more certain that the streets would be deserted and the forger himself had settled down for the evening.

  Behind Hansen, Gillespie was munching on French toast, which she said tasted better in the States, and working her laptop’s touch pad, scanning data from Moreau—Mr. Moreau. They’d searched the registrations of every hotel in France for a Francois Dayreis, along with every other alias Fisher had ever used during his tenure at Third Echelon, and they’d come up empty. They’d also searched for the names of the victims of the warehouse assault, but it seemed Fisher hadn’t used those IDs yet. If Boutin didn’t know anything about Fisher’s whereabouts, Hansen wasn’t sure what their next move would be.

  There were, however, two other leads to follow: Doucet and the warehouse.

  Noboru and Valentina were already out to meet the team’s runner in Reims, from whom they would pick up the gear and be outfitted for their visit to see Doucet, who’d been admitted to the Centre Hospitalier Universitaire at 45 rue Cognacq-Jay, about four kilometers southwest of the team’s hotel.

  Ames entered the room, car keys in hand. “You ready, chief?”

  Hansen turned from the window. “Hold down the fort, Kim, all right?”

 
She nodded.

  “And, you know, if you want, take a nap. Just leave the channel on in case I need to get you through the subdermal, all right?”

  “You got it.”

  Hansen walked over to Ames and ripped the car keys out of the man’s hand. “I drive.”

  NOBORU took the Opel to the parking garage of the Hotel Azur, located just five minutes west. He and Valentina drove to the far end of the garage as instructed. Noboru let the car idle. He glanced over at Valentina, who draped an arm across her eyes and rested her head on the seat. He felt compelled to say something but simply sat there.

  “How come you’re so serious, Nathan?” she blurted out.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you smile.”

  “I smiled once. Back in 2007.”

  She opened her eyes and smiled. “I like you. You’re one of the first guys I’ve met who doesn’t want to have sex with me.”

  “What makes you assume that?”

  “Because you don’t look at me that way.”

  “It’s impolite.”

  “Yes, it is. Your parents raised you right.”

  He took a deep breath. “I would still like to have sex with you.”

  And then he shocked her … by smiling. “Does that make you feel better?”

  She punched him in the arm. Hard. “The smile part does. So … I’m going to try to take just a little nap, just rest my eyes, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  Within a minute she was out. They were all exhausted, and Noboru repeatedly checked the rearview mirror while blinking his vision back to clarity and stifling a yawn.

  He didn’t want to close his eyes, because if he did, he knew he’d begin to hear the car horns and smell the herbs and roasting meat from the restaurants.

  The back window of his second-floor apartment in Kao-hsiung was open, and below lay piles of trash surrounding a pair of Dumpsters. Noboru was lying in bed, reading a newspaper, when they kicked in his door.

  Horatio moved in first, lifting his pistol with an attached silencer. He was forty, broad shouldered like a linebacker but narrow waisted and light on his feet. He’d been severely burned on his neck and lost part of his right ear. He’d never talked about how or why. He kept his bald pate shaved and glistening, and his right arm was entirely tattooed, probably to disguise more scars.

  Behind him came Gothwhiler, the scrawny extraterrestrial, pale as a ghost with hair dyed jet-black. He was older than Horatio, wore diamond earrings, and seemed to own only khaki cargo pants. Noboru had never seen him wear anything else in the ten months he worked for the man. Horatio and Gothwhiler were both Brits, former military men (they would not reveal more about that), and had founded a private military company, or PMC, called Gothos and headquartered in the United Kingdom.

  Noboru rolled off the bed, started for the window, but Horatio was already crying out, “Don’t do it, mate.”

  He hesitated, glanced back at the hard-eyed Brit.

  “Just return the money,” said Gothwhiler, lifting his own pistol.

  “I took back what was mine. Nothing more.”

  “We don’t care,” snapped Horatio. “You’re a very naive young man. And trust me. I know what it’s like to play with fire… .”

  Noboru had completed a two-part assassination job for the company, killing the CEO of a competing PMC headquartered in Hong Kong. Once he’d killed the old man, he’d been instructed to kill the man’s wife and seventeen-year-old daughter, in order to make a “lasting impression” on the firm’s remaining employees, whom Gothos wanted out of the mercenary business.

  After assassinating the CEO, Noboru had spent a week studying his targets and realized that he couldn’t bring himself to complete the job. He returned and asked for half of his two-hundred-thousand-dollar payment.

  Because he had not “completed” the mission, Gothwhiler had refused to pay him anything. With the help of an old friend in the special forces, Noboru hacked the company’s account and withdrew half his fee—only the half he believed they owed him.

  Consequently, Horatio and Gothwhiler had made it their mission in life to find him, get back their money, and then, of course, make Noboru suffer a long and painful death.

  Noboru had no intention of ever returning the money. He had already sent it to his parents in Yokohama, and they had already used it to save their house and get ahead on the bills. And if these two Brits were going to kill him, he’d force them to do it quickly, which was why, without a second’s hesitation, he threw himself out the window. Horatio fired and Gothwhiler screamed for him not to, since only Noboru knew where the money was and could return it.

  But Horatio was no amateur marksman, and his round had managed to catch Noboru in the right arm just as he’d been passing through the window.

  He landed in the garbage below and immediately rolled down the bags and came up, as the first stinging from the gunshot wound took hold. He rose, raced to the brick wall, and glanced down at his bleeding arm.

  Then he raced to the main entrance of the building, where he knew Horatio and Gothwhiler would emerge.

  They had surprised him in his apartment. He only wanted to return the favor.

  Gothwhiler came out first, and Noboru, in one fluid movement, took him from behind, wrapping an arm around his neck and seizing the man’s wrist so he could direct his pistol toward …

  Horatio, forcing both men to hold their fire, if only for a few seconds. Noboru drove his knee into Gothwhiler’s spine, and as the man groaned, he shoved him forward, into Horatio, who lost his footing and dropped back onto his rump.

  Two old men on the opposite side of the street began shouting, and, in that instant, Noboru made a decision.

  Run.

  He bolted around a row of parked cars, and, using them as a shield, crouched over and reached the next cross street.

  Now he was into a full sprint, weaving his way through the throng of pedestrians, stealing glimpses over his shoulder, feeling the blood dripping from his arm.

  His heart was drumming in his ears, rapping hard, sounding strangely like a knuckle rapping on glass.

  “What the hell is this, Bruce? Open up!”

  Noboru shook awake, his arm throbbing as it had back then, and found himself staring directly into Mr. Louis Moreau’s ugly mug and grateful there was a piece of glass between them.

  Moreau stepped back from the car and waved him out.

  “Maya, wake up. Our runner is here. I don’t think you’ll be happy.”

  HANSEN and Ames were about halfway to Boutin’s apartment when Grim called, and he spoke to her via his SVT and subdermal. “Ben, I need to make this brief. There’s been a slight change in how this operation will be coordinated. When your runner arrives, he’ll explain everything. I’ll be out of touch for a little while.”

  “Grim, wait. I have questions.”

  “I wish I could answer them. I really do. Suffice it to say that you need to focus on the job. Good luck, Ben.”

  “Wait.”

  She ended the call.

  “She says there’s been a change in plans, in how we’ll coordinate.”

  “What does that mean?” asked Ames.

  “The runner’s supposed to tell us.”

  “WHAT is this?” asked Valentina, standing outside their car. She was furious that Moreau et al had lied to them about his whereabouts and probably more. “You were just talking to Kim on the computer, and she said you were back at Fort Meade.”

  “First, let’s slow down, Nurse Ratched—and speaking of which, I’ve got your uniforms and IDs in the trunk.”

  “Nurse who?”

  “I don’t believe it. Are you going to stand there and tell me you have not seen One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest?”

  Valentina frowned. “It’s a movie?”

  “Of course it is, sunshine!”

  “I am not familiar with that movie, either,” said Noboru.

  “Aw, you boys and girls
got to be kidding me. When you’re drunk or bored sometime, Google it. For now, listen up.”

  Valentina snickered. “For the second time, why are you here?”

  “I’m getting to that. You’ll be coordinating directly with me right here in Reims, but we want them to think I’m at 3E headquarters.”

  “We want who to think?”

  “Kovac.”

  “What’re you talking about?”

  “He’s got his eyes and ears all over us. Grim and I decided that it was more important for me to work hands on this time around. So I brought you the gear and my shining personality, and I’ll be staying right here while you track Fisher. You’ll have a secure, encrypted link directly to me, and I’ll update Grim. Bottom line: Tech operations has just gone mobile. Hallelujah!”

  Moreau stood there a moment as Valentina and Noboru faced him, resigned to their fate.

  “What’s the matter, Nurse Ratched? You’re not happy to see me?”

  “Thrilled.”

  “Sir, I am glad to see you. I have been thinking about a nickname for you, and I wanted to share it.”

  “You’re not going to use foul language, Bruce, are you?”

  “No, sir. Have you seen the movie Pulp Fiction?”

  “Of course I have.”

  “You are Jules Winnfield, sir. You are a black hit man, but you don’t have the Jheri curls. When you retire, you will walk the earth like Caine in Kung Fu.”

  “You bet your ass I will.” Moreau threw his arm over Noboru’s shoulder. “Just don’t call me Grasshopper. Now, come with me. I got all kinds of heavy gear bags for you to load while I supervise. Then we’re going to dress you up nice and pretty like a nurse.”

  As they went to Moreau’s car, a silver four-door Mercedes (leave it to him to rent a Mercedes), Valentina activated her OPSAT and opened the channel to Hansen. “Ben?”

  “You make contact with the runner?”

  “Unfortunately, we did.”

  “What’s wrong?”

  Valentina took a deep breath and told him.

  Chapter 16.

  CENTRE HOSPITALIER UNIVERSITAIRE REIMS, FRANCE

  ROMAIN Doucet was sitting up in bed, his leg wrapped in a heavy cast and elevated by a sling. His face was a mottled mess of purple and yellow bruises, and somewhere amid those venous flowers was a pair of dark, narrow eyes. Valentina could only imagine how much swelling there had been, but some of it had subsided. Admittedly, it was unnerving to see a man this imposing as battered as he was; it suggested that his attacker was either bigger and stronger or a whole lot smarter. Valentina suspected the latter to be true. Indeed, Doucet was a giant of a Frenchman, over six feet, to be sure, with a chest like the front bumper of a pickup truck. You wouldn’t call the things at the ends of his arms hands, but paws, and his pitch-black hair was matted as though he’d been rolling around on a thick carpet.