Jeffery Deaver - Ice Cold

They will search you , Margaret had said. Stand through it like a girl, tense and ashamed.

The callow man took me down a flight of stairs to a rear door. He stopped me and placed his hands on my ribs.

“Excuse me,” I said, though to me his body search and added grope of my breasts were mere pressure. “I am no criminal.”

“Comrade Irinyi is a cautious man.”

“More expert than you, I should hope.”

The callow man gave me a jaundiced glance. “Not so gentle.”

He led me into the back of a dark Mercedes and slid in beside me. A junior officer drove us through Pest, deserted at one in the morning. The radio was kept off and none of us spoke, the only sounds our breathing and the wiper blades squeaking against the drizzle. The streetcars had shut down for the night.

Soon the Mercedes whisked us over the Danube. Out my window the towers of Fisherman’s Bastion stood like impotent knights watching the river flow. Buda Castle slumbered atop its hill. Further out were the shards of my childhood: Csepel, where my father was found dead in an alleyway, and Budafok, where the AVO came and dragged my mother off to die in a camp.

We drove through quiet neighborhoods and up into the hills, past vineyards and wooded estates. Soon we pulled off at a private gatepost, and a guard stepped out to search the car. He grunted a laugh at me in my floral dress and nylons. I lowered my head, ever the embarrassed girl. He would choke on his laughter if he knew how many Roma eyes watched him from the forest.

A dirt track cut through evergreens and linden trees and ended at a patch of land cleared for a cottage house. No cars were parked in front, but lights burned from the ground floor windows.

The callow man took me inside, into a parlor furnished with volumes of bound books, silver trays, and crystal glassware. A large painting of a hunting scene hung over the mantel. A newly started fire had done little to warm the cottage.

“Upstairs,” he said.

“I have to pee.”

“Do it fast.”

He left the door open and watched me the entire time. That told me what I wanted to know: he was thorough. The callow man would leave no opening to palm a knife or sneak his gun. He would respond quickly to any hint of trouble. I finished in the bathroom, and he showed me to a cramped stairway off the kitchen. “Work hard to earn a patron, Comrade Szabo.”

I took the stairs slowly to keep up appearances. Really it gave me a chance to slow my breath. In the bedroom Irinyi was waiting in what light reached up from below. He poured two shots of brandy.

“Come in, little bird. Cheer an old man with a kiss.”

Somewhere Typhon will have a gun , Margaret had said. Be the first to use it.

I closed the door behind me and crossed through the soup of shadows. Then I gave the devil his kiss. When as hollow as he, there was nothing lost by it.

Irinyi laughed. “I was not sure you would do it.”

“Why not?”

“There are two types of pretty Helenas, I find. The merely pretty and the too pretty to be true. You were invited tonight after a late recommendation from an officer of suspect loyalty. You wanted my attention but did not use it. You did not tease like the schemers or coax me off like the professionals. Now it is just us two, no bugs, no tapes. We drink to plain speaking, then you state your purpose.”

I let the shot burn down into my belly.

Irinyi contemplated me over his brandy. My eyesight had accustomed enough to catch a frown crease his ample cheeks. “Who do you work for?”

“Hungary.”

“Central Control knows the Hungarian spies. Tell me or I give you to Gyuri downstairs.”

“A man named Braintree sent me. He has a message: ‘Cicilia.’”

Irinyi went still. “One word. One simple word you could have delivered at the club.”

“Braintree insisted we be alone. At the club someone might overhear. Or be recorded.”

“Probably true.” Irinyi braced himself on the dresser and stood. “Time is short. As is trust. You must come with me as far as Budapest, little bird. Braintree tells you where to fly?”

“The British lie the same as the Russians, but in nicer suits. They have made a habit of abandoning Hungarians. Please, make them take me with you.”

Irinyi waved away the suggestion. He opened a closet, turned on its bare bulb and hefted out a suitcase. Age had robbed the devil of strength, the brandy of his balance. I would kill him with a lamp cord, a broken bottle, with my bare hands if necessary.

“Trust can be demonstrated,” I said, and where I placed his hand on my body left no doubt of my meaning.

“I prefer never to risk what Roma girls plan during such demonstrations. Flying to the West is no simple matter, little bird. We fly as the British say, no variation.”

“They will not take me without a confirmation word.”

“‘Echidna,’” he said. “Tell them ‘Echidna’ and they see that my bird flies.”

Irinyi opened his bag and shuffled through travel documents and stacks of American money. Tucked in the suitcase lid was a pistol, its aluminum polish catching the closet light. Aluminum meant a PA-63, its loaded magazine holding seven shots.

“How will we get clear of your men?”

Uncertainty flickered in his eyes, and he began rummaging through his case faster.

“Hit me.” I grabbed my dress at the collar and tore it open to expose my brassiere. “Hard. For us both it must look like I fought you. Otherwise, why leave now, unsatisfied? Just please, get me back to Budapest alive.”

Irinyi nodded. He swung a flabby hand at me, weak but catching my lip with his ring. I screamed and tumbled bawling across the bed. My skin burned where he struck me. I tasted blood, felt it dribble down my chin.

Heavy feet pounded up the wooden stairs. Irinyi spun toward the sound, preoccupied readying his story for the guard. He did not see me reach for the gun.

The callow man burst through the door and turned on the overhead light. “Comrade Deputy?”

“Little bitch likes to bite,” Irinyi said. “Take me to—”

I rolled off the bed and fired twice at the callow man. Both bullets hit the center of his chest. Any noise he made before dying did not carry over the ringing in my ears.

“Fool!” Irinyi said. “You have damned us! If all the hills did not hear, the guards will—”

I turned the gun toward Irinyi. “More likely they are already dead.”

The rage drained out of him. My devil rubbed his face while he collected his silver tongue. “The West pays far better than terrorists. Come with me. The British want me badly enough to grant anything. I can see you are more than comfortable.”

There never was much in me to charm. “The British can rot as they let us rot.”

Irinyi gave a resigned grimace and stood up tall, seeking more dignity in death than ever he had granted. “They do not stop hunting those who cross them. Hope they find you before my friends do. The British kill faster.”

“Not so fast as a Hungarian.”

I put three bullets into Irinyi. The first was for Csepel, a shot to his bald forehead. The last two I put in his heart, one for each of my parents.

I shut off all lights except the front room. Next I unlocked the doors and raised a shade one-third off the windowsill. From the woods a flashlight blinked its reply.

A minute later Margaret slipped inside the house. She inspected the pistol and wiped it over her coat. “Show me.”

Upstairs I let Margaret pace the bedroom and prod both dead men. She spat on Irinyi’s corpse.

“The saints make us their sparks,” Margaret said. “My Helena, brightest spark of all. One hour yet to reach the safe house. Flash the light twice and head for where I signaled. Braintree will be hard on you. Be just as hard.”