Middleton was down the hall, his back to Perez, and he was talking quietly to a man and a woman. The man was lanky and pale, and his jaw was darkened by a three-day beard. His eyes were shadowed and darting. The woman was tall, tanned, and broad-shouldered, and her dark hair was cut short. Perez hadn’t made a sound, but somehow Middleton knew he was there.
“Come meet some old friends, Jack,” he said, without turning around. Perez pocketed the Python and closed the door to his wife’s behind him.
“This is Jean-Marc Lespasse and Leonora Tesla, former colleagues of mine. Nora, J.M., this is my son-in-law, Jack Perez.”
Lespasse nodded at Perez, and Tesla put out a warm hand. “Harry has told us all that’s happened, Mr. Perez. I’m so sorry for what you and your wife have been through. Will she be all right?”
“She’s lost a lot of blood, but the docs say she’ll recover. All right is another story. I don’t know that either one of us will be all right again after this.”
As Tesla nodded sympathetically, Middleton said, “Nora and J.M. have been through the wringer themselves the past couple of days. A man nearly killed Nora in Namibia, and J.M. narrowly avoided abduction in Chapel Hill.”
“Jesus, Harry, is all this about—?”
“We think so,” Middleton said. “The man who attacked Nora was looking for me.”
“I didn’t hang around to find out what those clowns in the parking lot were after,” Lespasse added in a raspy whisper, “but I heard them speaking Serbian, and they were carrying those cheap shit Zastavas.”
“And this is all about…what? That fucking manuscript?” Perez asked.
Tesla and Lespasse shifted nervously. Middleton said nothing.
“For Christ’s sakes, Harry…” Perez said, shaking his head. He looked at Tesla. “How did you two manage to find us?”
“We both saw the news reports of Harry’s difficulty at Dulles, and knew that he was…in flight. We both guessed that he might turn up at the lake house.”
“I ran into Nora there,” Lespasse said.
“…and nearly blew my head off.”
“We saw the blood and thought the worst,” Lespasse added. “We started checking hospitals, closest ones first, and there you were.”
Perez turned back to his father-in-law. “Not too difficult. And the guys who are after you, whoever they are, seem fuckin’ relentless. How much longer before they turn up here too?”
Any answer Middleton might have given was interrupted by the night duty nurse. “You and your father-in-law will have to quiet down, Mr. Perez, and your friends will have to come back during regular visiting hours.”
Middleton seized the opportunity. “Yes, ma’am, and we’re very sorry. I’ll just see these folks out so Jack can sit with Charley.”
He took Tesla’s arm and led her and Jean-Marc toward the elevator, leaving Jack Perez grinding his teeth in the darkened hallway.
Outside, the air was warm and close. The hospital parking lot was nearly empty. Jean-Marc Lespasse lit a cigarette, inhaled deeply, and blew a column of smoke into the night sky.
Harry Middleton recalled the last time he’d seen Lespasse and Val Brocco. A blisteringly hot day at chaotic Kenyatta Airport. He remembered too his farewell to Nora Tesla. It had been somewhat after his final meeting with the two men and the location was much nicer — an Algerian-influenced inn on the Cote d’Azur — but the moment was no less difficult.
Events intervened…
She glanced at him once and then her eyes fled. Words seemed easier.
“Your family has no idea?” Leonora Tesla asked Middleton.
“No. I never told them — never thought I’d have to. I thought I could protect them from…all this.”
She clutched his hand, an instinctive gesture, and released it fast. “This isn’t your fault, Harry, but your son-in-law is right. It wasn’t difficult for us to find you, and it won’t be difficult for anyone else who’s looking. It’s not safe.”
“It’s safe enough for a little while — long enough for me to think things through. The Soberski woman asked about Faust. She thought I was into something with him.”
“So you said, Harry, and I told you, Eleana Soberski was a sociopath and a congenital liar,” Tesla said. “You have to assume that anything she said was meant to mislead and to manipulate. Faust was our boogeyman — our white whale — and she knew that. What better way to get you attention than dangle his name?”
“She didn’t have to dangle anything, Nora. She had a gun in my ribs.”
Blowing out more smoke, Lespasse said, “She thought she was going to be interrogating you, Harry. She was laying groundwork, putting you off balance. She—”
Before Lespasse could finish, Middleton’s cell phone burred. He found it in a pocket, flipped it open and heard only static. And then a faraway voice, old and struggling in English.
“Colonel Middleton? My name is Abraham Nowakowski. I’m calling from Rome and I have a message from Felicia Kaminski — Henryk Jedynak’s niece. An urgent message.”
Harold Middleton listened intently for several minutes. Then he said, “Ciao, Signor Abe, mille grazie.” Closing his phone, he let out a massive breath. Tesla and Lespasse looked at him expectantly.
“Speak of the devil, and the devil appears,” Middleton said. “Faust. He’s in the country, and close — up in Baltimore. He’s got something Henryk Jedynak was holding for me, and he’s got Jedynak’s niece too.”
“Baltimore? What the hell is he doing in Baltimore?” Lespasse asked.
“I don’t know. Jedynak’s niece managed to get a call out to a family friend in Rome — that’s who was on the line. From what he said, it sounds like Faust has some sort of operation going on there, but the girl was cut off after a minute.”
“Did she say where in Baltimore Faust is?” Tesla asked.
“No, but she did tell her friend where she and Faust would be tomorrow — check that — tonight. A place called Kali’s Court, on Thames Street. Apparently the two of them are going there for dinner. Just the two of them. I’m thinking that maybe we should join them.”
Tesla and Lespasse looked at Middleton. Tesla shook her head. “Join them? You can’t be serious, Harry — with only three of us.”
“We need backup for something like that, Colonel,” Lespasse said. “Unless what you want is in and out, bang, bang, bang.”
Middleton shook his head. “That’s appealing, but not smart. No, we need to talk to this guy, and at length. So backup it is.” Harry opened his phone again and clicked through his list of contacts. He stopped on an entry marked E.K. and hit dial.
The phone rang once.
The voice in Middleton’s ear said, “It’s about time you called, Harry. But then I guess you’ve had your hands full lately.”
“I need a team, Emmett,” Middleton said. “In Baltimore.”
“Sure you do, Harry. And what about what I need?”
“We can talk about that too, after we settle Baltimore.”
“We can fuckin’ talk about it now.”
“It’s been real bad luck for people to run into you lately, Harry. We’ve got bodies at Dulles, downtown on Sixteenth Street and two assholes with fake Bureau IDs in a bar nearby. Okay, sure, self-defense. But you still have to answer questions. And we can’t stop the local boys from bringing you in if they find out. Jesus, you should’ve told us from the beginning what was going on.
“Guess what, Emmett. Somebody forgot to send me an agenda. I didn’t know what was going on. And I still don’t.”