“Hardly. I wanted you to know that Mommy Dearest and her boy toy have launched phase two of the Initiative. The bodies are already dropping.”
Toys sighed. “Guess there’s no turning back now.”
“Nope. On the upside, Joe Ledger is still sucking air.”
“What?”
“Yeah, the crew Santoro hired screwed the pooch. It’s on the news. The rest of the Kings aren’t going to love Gault for this. It makes us look clumsy.”
“How’d Ledger escape? I thought Santoro was sending a whole team. Did you do something?”
“Me? No. Ledger slipped the punch all by himself. Well, he had his crew of goons. Echo Team. And … you’ll dig this … Circe O’Tree was there. She apparently capped one of Santoro’s shooters.”
Toys started to laugh, but it hurt his mouth. “Maybe Eris will finally have that stroke I keep hoping for,” he said.
“Hey now … that’s my mother,” said the American, but he was laughing, too.
Their laughter faded into a thoughtful silence. Finally, Toys said, “Isn’t there any way to stop the second phase?”
The American grunted. “Not a chance. It’s already too late.”
“Damn.”
“You worry too much, kiddo, and you’re looking at the wrong end of the timetable. Who gives a flying fuck if some of the Bonesmen spawn bite it? You need to decide if you want to let Gault’s showpiece play itself out.”
“He closed me out of that whole thing. What can I do?”
The American was quiet for a moment. “Maybe something will occur to you,” he said at last, and then he hung up.
Toys set the phone down on the desk. He placed it next to the other phone, the one the American had dropped. Toys leaned forward on his elbows and considered that other phone for a long time.
Something did, in fact, occur to him.
Chapter Fifty-nine
In Flight
December 19, 7:43 P.M. EST
For most of the flight I sat alone, processing what I’d learned from the shooter—whose name was Sarducci—and seeing if any of these new pieces fit the weird puzzle that was the Seven Kings. The fact of there being so many crucial employees in secure facilities kept shouting in the darkness of my thoughts, but I couldn’t yet understand what it was trying to tell me. Abstract thinking is like that. You gather facts and then throw them into a bag with guesses and bits of the unknown, and either a picture leaps out or it doesn’t. I kept shaking the bag and reaching in for a new fistful of Scrabble pieces.
When my phone rang I expected it to be Church, but the caller ID was blank, which was weird, because I have a DMS account. Nobody’s supposed to be an “unknown caller” to us.
“Yeah,” I said neutrally.
There was nothing. No … I could hear someone breathing.
“Bad time for an obscene phone call, sport,” I said.
“Joe Ledger?”
A male voice. Soft, a trace of an accent.
“I’ll see if he’s in. Who’s calling?”
“Don’t be clever,” he said. “We don’t have that kind of time.”
I was sure it was a voice I hadn’t heard before. He was trying to speak with an American accent, but it was a fake. I was sure of it. I pressed the three-digit code to initiate a trace.
“It’s your dime,” I said.
“You’re looking for the Seven Kings.”
Ah. “Who are you?”
“Don’t be daft,” he said. “And don’t bother to trace this call. It’s routed through a dozen networks on five continents.”
“Are you the person who’s been calling Mr. Church?”
“No. But—”
“Are you calling to screw around or—?”
“No, I’m calling to collect my thirty pieces of silver,” he said. He sighed and I waited. “I am not going to tell you who the Kings are or where to find them. Not all of them. I am not going to reveal all of their plans or give you the intelligence necessary to bring down the entire operation. That really would be a betrayal.”
Even with the scrambler I could hear the turmoil in his voice. It made him sound hysterical and even a little drunk. Either way, it was clear that this was someone who absolutely did not want to make this call.
“I am, however, going to offer you a deal.”
“I’m listening.”
“This isn’t for me,” he said, “and I want your word.”
“I can’t give any word unless I know what I’m swearing to.”
He paused and he was probably chewing his nails.
“I am going to say a name. It’s all I can give you, but you should be able to put two and two together to figure where to be to stop what the Seven Kings are really doing. You’ll save a lot of lives. You’ll be a hero.”
“I’m not looking to be a hero, sport. If you have information that can save lives, then let me have it.”
“I want your word. That’s the price.”
“My word on what?”
“That you won’t kill him.”
“Kill who? The person whose name you’re going to give me?”
“Yes. Swear to me that you won’t kill him and I’ll tell you.”
“How can I guarantee that?”
“You’re smart, Ledger. You’ll figure out a way. Do I have your word?”
I hesitated.
“Or,” he said, “I could hang up right now and you can watch the world burn. You think that what’s on the telly is the real news? Believe me, mate, this is the warm-up act. I want you to do something about it.”
“You have a lot of faith in me.”
“I should. I already have scars because of you,” he snarled.
“Whoa, slow down. Do I know you?”
His snarl turned into a laugh. “No … I doubt you even know my name. But you know his. You’re almost as much to blame as she is. Him and that slut Amirah.”
And that fast someone sucked all the air out of the chopper’s cabin. Amirah.
Holy Mother of God.
I knew the name he was going to give me. I knew it and I prayed like hell that I was wrong.
“Okay,” I said quietly, hardly trusting my voice not to crack, “tell me.”
“Give me your word.”
What could I do? I could lie, and it probably would be a lie. He would have to know that. So, what value did my word have to this man? On the other hand, what did I have to lose?
“Very well,” I said. “I give you my word that if I can take him alive and unharmed, I will.”
“Swear it.”
I did. I actually did.
There was a muffled sound. It wasn’t a laugh; I was sure of it. I think it was a sob.
He said, “There are Seven Kings. Gold, Fear, Lies, Plagues, Famine, War, and Thieves.” He took a breath. “Sebastian Gault is the King of Plagues. If he isn’t stopped, he’ll wipe them all out. And I know—I know—that he won’t stop there. She’ll keep pushing him and pushing him, filling his head with dreams of godhood until he creates another doomsday plague. I know he’ll do it … unless you stop him.”
I closed my eyes. God.
Sebastian Gault.
The man who tried to release the Seif Al Din pathogen. The man who came close—so very close—to destroying everything. It was because of him that I was sought out and recruited into the DMS. The last guy to hold my job had been killed. Slaughtered along with his entire team.
Sebastian Gault. If I had a personal bogeyman, then he was it.
After we stopped the release of Gault’s pathogen, a worldwide manhunt was launched. As large and as aggressive as the search for Osama bin Laden—and so far, just as futile. We’d begun to suspect that Gault was dead, his body burned in the same geothermal meltdown that had destroyed the lab where Seif Al Din was created. But now … Gault and the Seven Kings.