The way he’d killed a beautiful young fawn of a Tatar girl who’d only walked into the alley to see if they needed help.
That the mission had proved to be a dead end only added to Candy’s frustration. They’d laid over in Amsterdam already and would now enter the U.S. from the south, a not-worth-noticing commuter flight from Mexico City to San Diego. She was willing to endure any amount of hellacious travel and the myriad discomforts that came with it as long as the journey held the faintest glimmer of hope for catching Orphan X. She’d forge through fire and brimstone to get a crack at his untarnished flesh.
That’s why she hated return flights. They spelled failure.
She finished patting down her back and let the paper towels drop to the floor. Hanging her head, she eased a breath through her teeth. The air cooled the moist skin, a momentary break from the itching, the burn.
Putting her shirt back on would be unpleasant. Gathering her will, she stared at the bra wrapped around her clenched fist.
All her training, and here she was nearly vanquished by a 34D in a bathroom stall.
A boarding announcement for her flight echoed through the bathroom. She readied herself to finish dressing.
A vibration in her jeans caught her attention, the punk rendition of “I’m Every Woman.”
Excitement licked up her spine.
She clicked TALK, held the phone to her cheek.
“I HAVE made YOUR next RESERVation.”
“Already?”
“You HAVE to EAT WHILE the meal IS HOT.”
“Gladly,” she said. “How hot is this particular meal?”
“PIPING.”
The lick of excitement turned to a tremor.
“PARTICULARS to follow,” spoke the chorus, and then Van Sciver clicked off.
Grinning, Candy slid the phone back into her pocket. She pulled on her shirt and shoved through the stall door. On her way out of the bathroom, she dumped her bra in the trash.
After all, this called for a celebration.
45
A Different Kind of Ruckus
Hot water pounded the top of Evan’s head, streaming down his shoulders. No matter how long he stayed in the shower, it seemed he could not get warm. His internal clock told him that it was a few hours past midnight. René seemed to be forgoing the sleeping gas, perhaps in honor of Evan’s last night at Chalet Savoir Faire. Evan had been told that he would be hooded and driven away tomorrow, dropped off somewhere in the middle of nowhere so René would have plenty of time to clear out.
He had his doubts.
He figured René was waiting for the next business day to get a human confirmation from his own bank that the money had arrived and was free and clear. Then he would dispose of Evan.
For now Evan was back in his cage, and the cage had been made escapeproof. The bars on the balcony were rewelded and reinforced, the fireplace flue was bolted shut, and the front door had sprouted two more dead bolts. Evan had nowhere to go except into the shower, so here he was.
At last he got out and dried off using one of the bamboo-shoot-patterned towels. The shock collar seemed to be waterproof. The tape holding René’s fingerprint had all but sealed to the underside of Evan’s arm like a clear Band-Aid.
The plastic trash bag had been replaced in its spot near the toilet. The only person who’d seen him use it to thwart the collar was Nando, and he hadn’t survived long enough to tell anyone. Evan tried to take solace in this shred of an advantage.
His clothes remained balled on the floor where he’d kicked them off. He’d been searched well, but René’s men hadn’t thought to check beneath the insole of his left boot, where he’d hidden the piano wire.
They’d transformed his room into a dungeon, and all he had was a trash-can liner and a loop of piano wire.
He reminded himself that despair was not a luxury in which he could indulge right now.
He dug the RoamZone out from the pocket of his dirty jeans and studied the cracked screen, wondering where the boy was and what he was going through right now. He recalled the boy’s scared voice, his words distorted over a swollen lip: So what? I get beat up all the time. Evan looked at the four walls that held him. Being trapped was one thing. Being kept from helping a kid who needed him was nearly intolerable. You should see how they keep us here. Like cattle, all lined up.
And Alison Siegler. The Horizon Express would be nearing the locks of the Panama Canal by now, where her cries would be drowned out by the massive gates, the roaring culverts, the grinding machinery of the chambers. Every minute Evan was in René’s hands brought her closer to her destination. She was eight days from delivery.
Frustration raged, a blade-winged bird beating inside Evan’s chest. He forced himself to breathe evenly, to calm the bird, to focus.
He headed out of the bathroom and into the walk-in closet. He was just pulling on some clean clothes when he heard a rumbling from outside.
He rushed across the room and out onto the balcony, hard snow pelting him. The lights beneath the eaves bathed the front of the chalet in an alien glow that leaked around the corner. No one was in sight.
He heard the noise louder now, powerful engines roaring off the walls of the valley. Straining, he peered through the bars. The steel slats had been tripled, slicing his view into fissures.
The gravel road was blocked from view. He breathed and he waited.
At last an enormous moving truck edged into sight as it turned in to the circular cobblestone driveway and passed from his field of vision.
And then another.
Another.
The last parked with its rear still visible. Workers coalesced at the back of the truck around the rolling door. It rattled up on creaky tracks and banged, dislodging a shelf of ice from the roof.
Several of the men hopped inside, and a moment later an enormous flat item, sized like a barn door and ensconced in protective wooden crating, emerged. The workers lowered it from the truck, laboring under its weight, and staggered out of view toward the porch.
Evan realized now why René had chosen not to knock him out with halogenated ether. He wanted Evan to witness this.
Whatever this was.
The workers came back for another like-shaped object. Evan wondered just what the hell it was.
A few minutes later came a different kind of ruckus from deep inside the chalet.
Saws revving and power screwdrivers and the screech of rent metal.
Construction noises.
Evan returned to his room, put his ear to the sturdy front door, and listened for a while. After a time his legs grew sore, so he sat with his back to the door. An hour passed and then another, the clamor never subsiding. A few times he nodded off, but the sound was piercing and irregular enough to avert sleep.
The dread gathering in his stomach didn’t help either.
He watched the first light of morning filter through the bars. It crept across the floor, inch by inch. It had just reached his toes when he heard the moving trucks rumble away.
A blissful moment of silence followed.
Then the electricity hit, flame erupting around his neck, shooting tendrils of heat through his jaw and down into his chest. The shock flattened him to the floorboards.
It continued, feeding Evan a steady current of pain. Somewhere beneath the static, he realized that these were the new procedures before anyone entered his room. René was taking no more chances.
Sure enough, a moment later the door swung open, shoving his body aside.
Dex reached down and gathered him up.
46
All the Honey