She stiffened. Hell and damnation.
T. Santos.
Shock and excitement exploded through her.
“Sam, call Venable and have him try to trace this call.”
She punched the access button. “Catherine Ling. What do you want, Santos?”
“Your suffering. Your death,” Santos said. “That might satisfy me. Or perhaps not, but it will have to do. Don’t try to trace me, I have a protected phone and I won’t be talking to you for long. I just wanted to touch base with you in case you’re getting too smug. One destroyed helicopter. One inadequate fool who could not perform a simple kill is nothing in the scheme of things.”
“Nagoles is dead?” Relief. Then Cameron must be alive. “Then I think it’s considerably more than nothing to you that he was taken out. Things aren’t going your way, Santos? What a pity. Get used to it, you son of a bitch.”
“I’ve no intention of getting used to failure. I knew you’d cause me a few problems once you realized what I was doing. I’ll work through them.” His voice lowered to silky menace. “And I’ll make sure your pain will only be the more intense when it’s your turn.”
“What a coward you are, Santos. Why not come after me directly? Are you afraid? It’s easy to send your goons to kill my friends. Olena Petrov, a helpless woman in her home, Jantzen and Kirov by ambush. But it’s getting a little harder now. Erin Sullivan should have been simple, but it didn’t turn out that way. Why not cross any other targets off your list and let’s see if you can take me down.”
“Why should I do that? Because you’re hurting,” he said softly. “I can hear it. You’re trying to mask it, but the pain is there. And that means I’m winning.”
“The hell you are.”
“I didn’t choose those targets because they were easy. I chose them because they were your past. The woman who helped you as a child; Jantzen, your friend, who worked with you during the first years you were with the CIA; and Slantkey, who furnished you with information that set you on the path to save your son.”
“What are you getting at, Santos?”
“Do you know what Delores was to me? Everything. My past, my present, my future. She was me. When you killed her, you tore my heart out.”
“How dramatic.”
“Bitch.” He drew a harsh breath. “Go ahead, spit out your sarcasm. I’ll remember every word you say. I have such ugly memories of you. You standing in my home with that gun in your hand, looking down at my Delores. After they put me in prison, I lived with that memory, and so I set out to find exactly who you were. I know more about you now than that CIA you work for. Past. Present. Future. It seemed fitting that I take those away from you, too. I divided it into phases. Past. Petrov, Jantzen, Slantkey. People whose death would cause you pain and regret but not deep sorrow.” He paused. “The tip of the iceberg.”
“Go on.”
“The second phase—present. People who are in your life now, who’ve actually interacted with you in the last year or so. People whose death would bring you wrenching sorrow. Erin Sullivan was on that list.” He paused. “You became very close when you rescued her in San Francisco. She went away, but you kept in communication with her. Warm, affectionate, communication. Phone calls, e-mails. I enjoyed every one of them. But there are so many others. It’s really hard to choose. I know all about you and how to make everyone in your world jump through hoops. I was going to limit that phase to three, but I may have to expand it.”
“You won’t get the chance, you bastard.”
“Third phase—future. I don’t think I have to elaborate on that target, do I?”
Luke.
She didn’t answer.
“He’ll have to suffer excruciating pain, you know. I’ve been planning it in detail. You may go through as much agony as I did when you shot Delores.”
“You can’t convince me you felt anything for her. It’s all ego with you.”
“You’re wrong. And every time someone dies, you’ll realize how wrong. I’m sure you went over possible victims after you saw what was happening around you. There were more than you thought, weren’t there? How do you decide where I’m going to strike next? It may not be who you think it will be. I have to look at all the ramifications of a kill and see if it has the effect I want. Who will it be? You’ll know very soon, Catherine.”
“You listen to me.” She had to struggle to keep her voice steady and not show him the panic she was feeling. “I’ve got my people covered. You’re not going to be able to touch them. And I’m not going to wait around and worry about how you’re going to decide anything. I’m going after you. I’m going to punish you and everyone around you for killing my friends. And, if you even get near my son, I’ll destroy you in the most painful way possible. That’s your future, Santos.” She hung up.
She leaned back against the wall, fighting for control.
Sam shook his head as he hung up his own phone. “Venable wasn’t able to trace the call.” He pulled out the kitchen chair and pushed her down. “You need a cup of coffee.”
“No, I don’t. I need to kill Santos.”
“That can come next.” He went to the coffeemaker and poured her a cup of coffee. “Nasty?” He brought her the cup. “Of course it was nasty. I heard it from your side. Did you learn anything?”
“Maybe. I’ve got to think about it.” She took a sip of the hot coffee. “He’s got this plan … Past. Present. Future. We’re in present mode. He’s going after people who are important to me that are currently in my life. That’s why Erin was targeted.”
“But you haven’t seen Erin in months.”
“Close enough for him, evidently.” She rubbed her temple. “He has to have been having me followed and tapping my e-mails. He knew I’d been in communication with Erin.” To whom else had she sent warm, affectionate e-mails?
Kelly Winters. Her name jumped first into Catherine’s mind. Kelly was not only Luke’s friend but Catherine’s, and it had been natural to keep in contact with her while she was at college. Kelly and her mother had a very cool, distant relationship, and Catherine knew about loneliness. Would there be something in one of those e-mails to Kelly that would trigger a target?
“I have to go back and check any messages I’ve sent out to anyone within the last six months. If Santos would consider that the present.” She set her cup down on the table. “I’ll call Venable back and let him know Santos’s plan and that Nagoles seems to be out of the picture. Then I’ll call Hu Chang. I need to keep him up to date.”
And she needed to talk to him and hear his voice. She knew that he was doing what was best in keeping Erin safe, but she wanted him with her. It was all very well for him to say that he could take care of himself, but it didn’t keep her from being afraid for him. Hu Chang was her past, present, and, God willing, her future. He was her best friend and the one person who could banish the loneliness that was always with her. Those facts alone would make him a prime candidate for Santos’s hit squad.
How do you know where I’m going to strike next?
Not Hu Chang. Please not Hu Chang.
She started to dial Venable.
Venable rang through before she made the connection. “Fill me in.”
She briefly went over the conversation. “Principally threats and his grand plan. I think he wanted to make sure I knew he wasn’t worried that we’d taken out Nagoles. And it must be frustrating not to be able to actually see the effect of a strike. I may be getting other calls from him if we don’t pull him in right away. No way of tracing?”
“Not unless he’s on the line a hell of a long time.” He paused. “He said you’d hear soon about a new victim?”
“He might have been trying to scare me.”
“Maybe.”
There was a note in his voice that caused her to tense.
“Dammit, something’s happened?”
“No, it’s something that didn’t happen. I checked on the agent monitoring Kelly Winter, and he said she slipped out of her morning class, and he lost her.”