Nelson DeMille - Night Fall

At about 10P.M., I excused myself with the explanation of jet lag and too much rich food and wine, which I wasn’t used to in Yemen.

She stood, and we shook hands. Then, I leaned over and gave her a kiss on the cheek and said, “You’re a trouper. This will all end well.”

She smiled and nodded.

“Thanks again for the shirt. Good night.”

“Good night,” she replied.

I checked my cell phone for messages, but there weren’t any. I left a wake-up call for 6:45, then I watched the news for a while, then popped in the videotape of A Man and a Woman. I fast-forwarded through the beach blanket scenes, and played the last few minutes in slow motion from where I could see the glow on the horizon, followed by the light rising into air. I tried to be skeptical and to give it another interpretation, but the camera didn’t lie. I played it backwards, to see if that would reveal something that could be interpreted differently-but frontwards, backwards, slow motion, normal speed, it was what it seemed to be: a missile, with a fiery tail and a smoke plume, rising toward the lights of an aircraft. It was the small zigzag of the light and smoke right before the explosion that convinced me, if I needed more convincing-the fucking missile corrected its course, locked on, and hit its target. Mystery solved.

I took the tape out of the video player and put it under the mattress, and put the steak knife on my night table.

I fell into a restless sleep and kept replaying the videotape in my dreams, except it was me on the beach, not Bud, and it was Kate, not Jill, standing naked next to me, saying, “I told you it was a missile. Can you see it?”

CHAPTER FORTY-NINE

My wake-up call came at 6:45, and I rolled out of bed, reached under the mattress, pulled out A Man and a Woman, and stared at it awhile.

I looked out the window toward Central Park. I’m not a Monday person, and the weather outside didn’t improve my mood; it was cloudy and raining, something I hadn’t seen in forty days in Yemen. Not that I wanted to be back in Yemen.

After I showered, I got dressed in my increasingly comfortable tan slacks, and put on the pink shirt. If I saw Ted Nash today, and if he made a comment about the shirt, I’d have to kill him.

Aside from that, today was going to be what’s called a Big Day. Today, I’d speak to Nash, and if he’d gotten his act together with Washington, we’d meet with the appropriate parties present. I had to think about who should be at that meeting, where it should be held, and if I should bring one of the videotapes. I’m not much of a meeting person, but I was looking forward to this one.

Most important, this was a big day because Kate was coming home.

I thought about the airport greeting committee, which could possibly include men with different agendas regarding who should take Kate into a waiting car. It could get very sticky, but Dom was good at going psychotic when anyone fucked with him. And Kate, as I’d found out, was no slouch, either, when it came to getting her way.

By now she was airborne, and maybe I should have e-mailed or called her last night, alerting her to a possible situation at the airport. But if she was under the eye-and she probably was after my meeting with Nash-then neither her e-mail nor her phones would be secure.

I checked myself out in the full-length mirror. The pink really did bring out my tan.

I went into the living room, and Jill was sitting at the dining table wearing a white Plaza robe, having coffee, and reading the New York Times . I said, “Good morning.”

She looked up. “Good morning.” She added, “That shirt looks good on you.”

“It’s going to become one of my favorites. Did you sleep well?”

“No.”

I sat at the table, poured myself coffee, and said, “Yesterday was a stressful day for you.”

“That’s an understatement.”

I sipped my coffee and looked at her over the brim of my cup. She seemed relaxed, but I thought the reality of the situation was starting to sink in. I asked her, “Have you had second thoughts about any of this?”

“No. In fact, I feel more strongly that I did the right thing.”

“There’s no question that you did.”

She insisted that I needed breakfast, and we looked at the room service menu. Jill said she was going to have the healthy heart breakfast and suggested I have the same.

We chatted, read the papers, and watched Today with Katie and Matt.

Breakfast came, and the healthy heart meal gave me acid.

After breakfast, Jill wanted to take a walk and wanted me to join her, but I said, “I need to stay here. I may have to go to a meeting. And you may need to join me. Call me every hour, and check your cell phone every half hour.”

“All right… what kind of meeting?”

“The kind you should have had five years ago.”

She nodded.

I said, “You won’t have to say anything. You just need to be there. I’ll do the talking.”

She replied, “I can speak for myself.”

I smiled at her. “I’m sure you can.”

She went into her bedroom, got dressed, then came back into the living room. She asked me, “Do you need anything while I’m out?”

I needed my Glock, but I said, “I’m running low on toothpaste.” I wasn’t, but she needed to do something. “Crest. And see if you can find another copy of A Man and a Woman. Also, don’t forget to call up to the room before you come back to the Plaza.” I took a pen from the desk and wrote Dom Fanelli’s cell phone number on my business card and gave it to her. I said, “If you can’t get me on the phone, or if you sense a problem, call Detective Fanelli at that number. He’ll tell you what to do.”

She looked at me and asked, “Is this your army of angels?”

I wouldn’t actually describe Dom Fanelli as an angel, but I replied, “Yes.” I added, “He’s your guardian angel if something happens to me.”

She said, “Nothing is going to happen to you.”

“No. Have a good day.”

She wished me a good day and left.

Maybe I should have kept her here, where it was marginally safer than out there. But I’ve baby-sat enough witnesses to know that they can start to become resentful, even hostile, if they’re kept cooped up too long. Also, in this case, it would be more difficult for Nash to snatch both of us if we were separated.

I checked my cell phone, but there were no messages from Ted Nash, or anyone.

I called my home answering machine, and there were a few messages, but none of them from Nash.

I called Dom Fanelli’s cell phone, and he answered. I asked, “How are you making out with the VIP airport escort?”

“I think I have it lined up. I had to call in all kinds of favors, make up a ton of bullshit, and promise the fucking world. I’ve got two uniforms and one borrowed PD. I’m going to meet them on the street at three, and we should be at the gate before Kate’s flight lands.”

“Sounds good. Here’s another thought-if the Feds are there waiting for her, they may decide to meet her before Passport Control. You need to get in there and avoid that possibility.”

“I’ll try… I know some Port Authority cops… I’ll see what I can do.”

“You have to do it. Also, don’t get on the scene too early, or you’ll tip your hand, and they’ll call up the reinforcements, and you’ll get into a pissing match that you may lose. It’s got to be like a snatch job. In and out before they can react.”

“You’re making a hard job harder.”

“You can do it. Unless they’ve got a Federal warrant for her, she’ll voluntarily go with you, who she knows.”