Drake thought he detected some slight resentment, as though Chigaru felt put out that they hadn’t arranged their accommodations with him. He wondered if the skinny Egyptian would have gotten a cut of their room fees. He might be able to acquire guns and vehicles and information, which were higher-ticket items, but Drake suspected Chigaru would not have minded taking a commission on just about anything. Like the tour guides who received kickbacks from souvenir shops if they directed tourists there, Chigaru wanted his percentage-a chance, as Sully often put it, to “dip his beak.”
“It looks nice,” Jada agreed, popping open the door. “I’ll be happy just to lie down.”
Drake slid from the backseat and dragged his duffel with him. They had stopped in the middle of nowhere-and nowhere might have been exaggerating its significance-to divvy up the guns Chigaru had acquired for them. Sully and Drake each had tucked Belgian FN Five-sevens in clip holsters at the small of their backs. An armpit holster would have been too conspicuous, and so would a jacket worn in the Egyptian heat. With their shirttails out, the guns would be hidden but easily accessible.
Jada had taken the SIG P250, a smaller, more compact weapon that carried a few rounds less. Her father had taught her to shoot at a range in upstate New York, but she had never even pointed a gun at another human being, so though she reluctantly accepted the weapon, she kept it in her duffel.
With a cold Coke in hand, the glass bottle dripping, Sully climbed out and leaned on the roof, looking over the top as Chigaru got out of the car.
“You know how to romance a guy, Chigaru,” Sully said. “You always take me to the nicest places.”
Chigaru smiled and patted his pockets, digging out his cigarettes and a lighter.
“You are on your own from here, my friends,” he said, glancing around at the three of them. “The car is yours. Leave it at the airport in Cairo when you’re done or text me and let me know where you’ve abandoned it and I’ll send someone to get it. You have my number should you require anything else.”
Sully grabbed his duffel and walked around to shake Chigaru’s hand. “I think we’ve got it as under control as we’re ever going to. I’ll see to it that the second half of your money is wired into your account before my head hits the pillow tonight.”
Drake fished another bottle of water out of the cooler in the car. The ice had melted almost completely by now, but the drinks were still cold enough to be sweet relief.
Chigaru gave a small bow, then dropped the car keys into Sully’s hand. “Good hunting, my friend.”
Jada and Drake thanked him as well and then fell into step with Sully, headed for the hotel. Chigaru remained by the car, leaning against the trunk of the car with his sunglasses glinting in the late afternoon sunlight.
“What, he’s just going to hang around out here?” Jada asked, her voice low.
“A guy that suave? I’m sure someone’ll be along to pick him up,” Drake said.
“You’re just jealous that you’re not that suave.”
“Suave is overrated and very last century. I’m rugged and sometimes adorably awkward,” Drake replied.
Before Jada could fill the obvious opening with good-natured mockery, Sully pushed between them, shouldering them apart like a teacher worried that his young charges were dancing a little too close at a junior high school mixer.
“Can you two cut it out with the cute banter?” Sully said. “You’re making me nauseous.”
Drake smiled innocently. He would have liked to tell Sully that he was just trying to keep Jada’s mind off her father’s death and the reason they were in Egypt to begin with, but he didn’t want to talk about it with Jada right beside them.
“I’m sure Chigaru’s arranged for transport,” Sully told Jada. “I figure he’ll be gone within the hour.”
Drake glanced over his shoulder at Chigaru, who leaned against their car, smoking, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. Even at a distance, the man looked in control of the world around him. He might have been little more than a minion for hire, but it was clear he didn’t see it that way.
“As soon as it gets dark, I’ll sweep the car,” Drake muttered to Sully.
“Sweep for what?” Jada asked.
“Bugs,” Sully said. “Maybe explosives.”
She paled. “We just drove more than two hours in that car.”
“He wouldn’t blow it up with himself inside. He’s an entrepreneur, not a suicide bomber.”
Jada narrowed her eyes and glanced back at the parking lot. They were almost to the hotel door, but they could still see Chigaru leaning against the car. She pressed her lips together in irritation.
“It just seems wrong. You paid him.”
Sully laughed softly. “There’s always somebody willing to pay more, darlin’. Remember that. Money can’t buy more than a minute’s worth of loyalty.”
Drake glanced over the lake-visible to him now only through the fronds of a young palm-and despite the glare off the water, he saw a silver go-fast boat jet into view. It must have cut its engines a moment later, for it seemed to stop short in the water, rising and falling on its own wake as it settled and drifted, the nose turning to point toward the hotel like an arrow. Or a bullet.
Narrowing his gaze, he saw a second, apparently identical boat about a hundred yards farther out, also drifting with its nose pointing toward the Auberge du Lac. The sudden arrival of the second boat couldn’t have anything to do with them-he knew that would be too much of a coincidence-but both of the crafts seemed to have an air of purpose around them, as if they were there on business rather than pleasure.
Then Sully called his name, breaking his train of thought, and he saw that Jada was holding the interior door open for them. Drake followed them in, basking in the cool, air-conditioned interior of the hotel, and the go-fast boats were forgotten.
As late as the 1940s, political figures from around the world had met and stayed at the Auberge du Lac for minisummits that helped determine the fate of global relations. The hotel still had the flavor of that bygone era, with its lazy ceiling fans and huge round arched windows and the woodwork in the lobby that seemed to hint at the architect’s love of Swiss ski chalets. It seemed to Drake like the sort of place that Rick and Ilsa would have escaped to for a romantic tryst if only Casablanca had ended differently.
Sully glanced right, then split off to the left, taking up a position with his back to a pillar. From there he could watch them at the check-in counter and still watch the door and most of the lobby. Drake fought the temptation to wisecrack. The time for digressions had passed. Once they had stepped into the lobby, they had entered the territory of mystery. Somewhere here there were clues as to why Luka Hzujak had been cut up and dumped on a train platform in an old steamer trunk, and Drake’s usually mischievous nature was tempered by the weight of the man’s death.
Drake and Jada approached the front desk. The man who greeted them gave only the hint of a smile. His red jacket was neatly pressed, and his gray hair and seamless features seemed to have undergone the same process.
“Good afternoon, sir,” the man said, nodding first to Drake and then to Jada. “Madam. How may I help you?”
“We have reservations. This is Mr. Merrill,” Jada said, indicating Drake as she gave the name on his fake passport. “You’ll have mine under Hzujak.”
She spelled her last name for him. Drake was glad she had remembered to grab her real passport when they had stopped at the apartment she’d been hiding out in back in New York. She had traveled under her new, false identification-just as Drake and Sully had-but here it was important that she be Jada Hzujak.
The clerk tapped keys on a computer keyboard and studied his monitor, frowning. He’d seen something in the reservation he didn’t like. He took their passports-Jada’s real one and Drake’s fake-and set them beside his computer. A few more taps, some sleight of hand, and then he was handing Drake a small envelope containing a pair of plastic key cards.