“She was murdered along with the crew of the same ship, only then it was called the San Marino.”
“Yes, I recall,” said Min Koryo, dropping all pretense. “The girl with the stolen money.”
Pitt stared into the old woman’s face, examining it. The blue eyes were bright and glistening, and the skin was smooth, with only a bare hint of aging lines. She must have truly been a beautiful woman once. But beneath the veneer Pitt detected ugliness, a cesspool locked in ice. There was a black malignity inside her that filled him with contempt.
“I suppose you’ve smashed so many lives,” he said, “you’ve become immune to human suffering. The mystery is how you got away with it for so long.”
“You have come to arrest me?” she asked.
“No,” Casio answered stonily. “To kill you.”
The piercing eyes blazed briefly. “My security people will come through the door any second.”
“We’ve already eliminated the guard at the receptionist’s desk and the one outside your door. As to others”— Casio paused and pointed a finger at a TV camera mounted above her bed—”I’ve reprogrammed the tapes. Your guards at the monitors are watching whatever occurred in your bedroom a week ago last night.”
“My grandson will hunt you both down, and your punishment will not be quick.”
“Lee Tong is dead,” Pitt informed her, relishing every syllable.
The face altered. Now the blood flowed out of it and it became a pale yellow. But not with the emotions of shock and hurt, Pitt thought. She was waiting, waiting for something. Then the flicker of expectancy vanished as quickly as it had come.
“I do not believe you,” she said at last.
“He sank with the laboratory barge after I shot him.”
Casio moved around to the side of the bed. “You must come with us now.”
“May I ask where you’re taking me?” The voice was still soft and gracious. The blue eyes remained set.
They didn’t notice her right hand move beneath the covers.
Pitt never really accounted for the instinctive move that saved his life. Maybe it was the sudden realization that the TV camera was not exactly shaped like a camera. Maybe it was the complete absence of fear in Min Koryo, or the aura that she was in firm command, but as the beam of light stabbed out from above her bed, he pitched himself to the floor.
Pitt rolled to his side, tugging the automatic from his coat. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the laser beam sweep the room, cutting through furniture, scorching the draperies and wallpaper with a needle-thin spear of energy. The gun was in his hands, blasting away at the electron amplifier. At his fourth shot, the beam blinked out.
Casio was still standing. He reached out toward Pitt and then stumbled and fell. The laser had cut through his stomach as neatly as a surgeon’s scalpel. He twisted over on his back and stared up. Casio was seconds away from death. Pitt wanted to say something, but he couldn’t get the words out.
The case-hardened old investigator raised his head; his voice came in a rasping whisper. “The elevator… code four-one-one-six.” And then his eyes went sightless and his breathing ceased.
Pitt took the transmitter from Casio’s pocket, rose and trained the automatic just ten inches from Min Koryo’s heart. Her face was locked in a fearless smile. Then Pitt lowered the gun and reached under the covers and silently lifted her out of the bed into her wheelchair.
She made no move to resist, spoke no words of defiance. She sat, wizened and mute, as Pitt pushed her into the corridor and onto a small lift that lowered them to the office floor. When they reached the reception lobby, she noted the unconscious security guard and looked up at him.
“What now, Mr. Pitt?”
“The final curtain for Bougainville Maritime,” he said. “Tomorrow your rotten business will be no more. Your Oriental art objects will be given away to museums. A new tenant will come in and redecorate your offices and living quarters. In fact, your entire fleet of ships will be sold off. From now on the name of Bougainville will be nothing but a distant memory in newspaper microfilm files. No friends or relatives will mourn you, and I’ll personally see that you’re buried in a potter’s field with no marker.”
At last he had broken through and her face revealed a searing hate. “And yourfuture, Mr. Pitt?”
He grinned. “I’m going to rebuild the car you blew up.”
She weakly lifted herself from the wheelchair and spat at him. Pitt made no move to wipe away the spittle. He simply stood there and grinned wickedly, looked down and saw the evil viciousness erupt as she cursed him in Korean.
Pitt pressed the code numbers Casio had given him into the transmitter and watched as the doors to Liftonic QW-607 opened.
But there was no elevator, only an empty shaft.
“Bon voyage,you diabolic old crone.”
Then he shoved the wheelchair into the vacant opening and stood listening as it clattered like a pebble down a well, echoing off the sides of the shaft until there was the faint sound of impact a hundred stories below.
Loren was sitting on a bench in the concourse as he came through the main door of the Trade Center. She came toward him and they met and embraced. They clung together without saying anything for a few moments.
She could feel the fatigue and the pain in him. And she sensed something more. A strange inner peace that she had never known was there. She kissed him lightly several times. Then she took his arm and led him to a waiting taxi.
“Sal Casio?” she asked.
“With his daughter.”
“And Min Koryo Bougainville?”
“In hell.”
She caught the distant look in his eyes. “You need rest. I’d better check you into a hospital.”
Suddenly the old devilish look flashed on his face. “I had something else in mind.”
“What?”
“The next week in a suite in the best hotel in Manhattan. Champagne, gourmet dinners sent up by room service, you making love to me.”
A coquettish expression gleamed in her eyes. “Why do I have to do all the work?”
“Obviously I’m in no condition to take command.”
She held on to him comfortingly. “I suppose it’s the least I can do after you saved my life.”
“Semper Paratus,”he said.
“Semperwhat?”
“The Coast Guard motto. Always Ready. If their rescue helicopter hadn’t arrived over the barge when it did, we’d both be lying on the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico.”
They reached the taxi and Loren held on to Pitt as he stiffly entered and sank into the seat. She eased in beside him and kissed his hand while the driver sat patiently looking out his windshield.
“Where to?” the driver asked.
“The Helmsley Palace Hotel,” Pitt answered.
Loren looked at him. “You’re getting a suite at the Helmsley?” she said.
“A penthouse suite,” he corrected her.
“And who’s going to pay for this opulent interlude?”
Pitt looked down at her in mock astonishment. “Why, the government, of course. Who else?”
About the Author
CLIVE CUSSLER’s life nearly parallels that of his hero, Dirk Pitt®. Whether searching for lost aircraft or leading expeditions to find famous shipwrecks, he has garnered an amazing record of success. With his NUMA® crew of volunteers, Cussler has discovered more than sixty lost ships of historic significance. Like Pitt, Cussler collects classic automobiles. His collection features more than eighty-five examples of custom coachwork and is one of the finest to be found anywhere. Cussler divides his time between the deserts of Arizona and the mountains of Colorado.