In an instant, Alicia appeared ready to go, eyes and expression so fired up she could ignite a desiccated forest.
“I’d love to get you alone,” she whispered.
Marsh paused, then continued quickly. “The Natural History Museum, twenty minutes.”
Drake set his watch. “And then?”
“Hmmm, what?”
“It’s a big ass piece of architecture.”
“Oh, well if you get that far I’d suggest stripping a male guard called Jose Gonzales. One of our associates sewed my demands into the lining of his jacket last night. Ingenious way to transport documents, eh, and with no comeback to the originator.”
Drake didn’t reply, more perplexed than anything.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Marsh said, again showing amazing cerebral qualities. “Why not just mail you the pics and tell you my demands? Well, I am a peculiar man. They told me I have two sides, two minds and two faces, but I prefer to see it as two separate qualities. One part twisted, the other bent. You see what I mean?”
Drake coughed. “I certainly know what you are.”
“Excellent, then I know you will understand that when I see your four torn-apart corpses in about seventeen minutes, I will feel both wonderfully happy and terribly annoyed. With you. Now, goodbye.”
The line went dead. Drake clicked his watch.
Twenty minutes.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Hayden and Kinimaka spent their time with Ramses. The terrorist prince appeared ill at ease in his six-foot square celclass="underline" dirty, disheveled and, though clearly exhausted, pacing like a caged lion. Hayden donned a flak jacket, checked her Glock and spare ammo, and bade Mano do the same. No chances would be taken from here on in. Both Ramses and Marsh had proven too clever to underestimate.
Perhaps the terrorist myth was right where he wanted to be.
Hayden doubted it, doubted it immensely. The fight inside the castle and the desperate death of his bodyguard had showed how anxious he’d been to escape. Also, was his reputation ruined? Shouldn’t he be trying desperately to repair the damage? Probably, but the man wasn’t destroyed to the level where he couldn’t rebuild. Hayden watched him stride as Kinimaka fetched them a couple of plastic chairs.
“There is a nuclear weapon in this city,” Hayden said. “Which I am sure you know, since you brokered the deal to Tyler Webb and Julian Marsh. You are in this city and if the time comes we’ll make damn sure you’re not underground. Of course, your followers don’t know we have you…” She let it hang right there.
Ramses pulled up, tired eyes fixing on her. “You refer to the double-cross of course, where my men will soon kill Marsh, take charge of the bomb and detonate. You must know this through Webb and his bodyguard since they are the only ones who knew. And you also know that they merely await my command.” He nodded as if to himself.
Hayden waited. Ramses was sharp, but that didn’t mean he wouldn’t slip up.
“They will detonate,” Ramses said. “They will make the decision themselves.”
“We can make your last few hours pretty much intolerable,” Kinimaka said.
“You won’t make me call it off,” Ramses said. “Even through torture. I will not halt that detonation.”
“What do you want?” Hayden asked.
“There will be negotiation.”
She studied him, looking intently into the face of the new world enemy. These people didn’t want anything in return, they wouldn’t negotiate and they believed death was but a step up to some kind of Heaven. Where does that leave us?
Where indeed? She felt for her weapon. “A man who wants nothing other than to commit mass murder is easily dealt with,” she said. “With a bullet to the head.”
Ramses pressed his face to the bars. “Then go ahead, western bitch.”
Hayden didn’t need to be an expert to read the madness and zeal shining from those soul-dead eyes. Without a word she changed tack and exited the room, locking the outer door carefully behind her.
Never too careful.
The next room along housed the cell of Robert Price. She had gained permission to keep the Secretary here because of the imminent threat and his potential part in it. As she and Kinimaka walked into the room, Price turned a supercilious expression upon her.
“What do you know about the bomb?” she said. “And why were you in the Amazon, attending a terrorist bazaar?”
Price sank down into his bunk. “I want a lawyer. And what do you mean? A bomb?”
“Nuclear bomb,” Hayden said. “Here in New York. Help yourself, you piece of shit. Help yourself right now by telling us what you know.”
“Seriously.” Price stared. “I know nothing.”
“You committed treason,” Kinimaka said, moving his bulk close to the cell. “Is that how you want to be remembered? An epitaph for your grandkids. Or would you rather be known as the repentant who helped save New York?”
“As lovely as you make that sound,” Price’s voice rattled like a coiled snake. “I wasn’t involved in any ‘bomb’ negotiations and know nothing. Now, please, my lawyer.”
“I’ll give you a little while,” Hayden said. “Then I’m gonna put Ramses and you together, in the same cell. You can fight it out. We’ll see who talks first. He would rather die, not live, and he wants to take every living soul with him. You? Just make sure you don’t commit suicide.”
Price looked flustered at at-least some of her words. “No lawyer?”
Hayden turned around. “Fuck you.”
The Secretary watched her go. Hayden locked him inside and then turned to Mano. “Any ideas?”
“I’m wondering if Webb is involved in this. He’s been the figurehead all along.”
“Not this time, Mano. Webb isn’t even stalking us anymore. This is all Ramses and Marsh, I’m sure.”
“So what’s next?”
“I don’t know how else we can help Drake and the guys,” Hayden said. “The team is already at the very core of this. Homeland have everything else managed, from cops kicking in doors to spies pulling their hard-earned covers, to army build-up and the arrival of NEST, the Nuclear Emergency Support Team. FDNY are everywhere, with all they’ve got. The bomb squad is at the highest alert. We have to find a way to break Ramses.”
“You saw him. How do you break a man who doesn’t care if he lives or dies?”
Hayden stopped angrily. “We have to try. Or would you rather just give up? Everyone has a trigger. That worm cares for something. His fortune, his lifestyle, a concealed family? There has to be something we can do to help.”
Kinimaka wished they could call on Karin Blake’s computer expertise, but the woman was still embroiled in her Fort Bragg regime. “Let’s go find a workstation.”
“And pray we have time.”
“They’re waiting for Ramses’ go ahead. We have some time.”
“You heard him as well as I, Mano. Sooner or later, they’re gonna kill Marsh and detonate.”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Dahl listened to the conflicting comms reports as Smyth guided their vehicle through the congested streets of Manhattan. Luckily, they didn’t have far to go and not every concrete artery was fully clogged. The entire cast of informers had been dragged out for this one, it seemed, from the lowliest gutter snitch to the richest, dishonest billionaire and everything in between. This made for a clutter of conflicting reports, but Homeland were doing their very best to sort the reliable from the polluted.
“Two of the known cells have strong links to a nearby mosque,” Moore was telling Dahl over the earpiece. He reeled off an address. “We have an undercover there, though he’s pretty new. Says the place has been on lockdown all day.”