Jeff Abbott - The Last Minute

‘Why? If we wanted you and your son dead, you would both be dead.’ She smiled, tasted her beer again. ‘Because you have no choice, Sam. That seems to me to be common sense. You must do as we say. We own you.’ She leaned back a little. ‘Your child is cute. He favors you in the eyes, he has his mother’s mouth.’

‘You sold him.’

‘So you were told. But we didn’t. We kept Daniel close, in case he was useful to us. I think it was a smart move.’

‘You want me to kill a man.’ My mind felt clouded. There must be something very special about this man. He must be hard to kill, or hard to reach, or hard to find.

‘And failure, as they say, is not an option. If you don’t kill him maybe we won’t kill Daniel – you will never know – but we won’t sell him to a sweet and kind family. There are all sorts of unappealing people… who will buy a baby.’

I wanted to fling the heavy table into her face. But I bottled the rage. Stuffed it down. Not the time. But I was going to make those words taste like ash in her mouth.

‘Uh, uh,’ Anna said. ‘Anger is destructive. Here is what happens now. Nod if you understand me – I’ve grown tired of your voice.’

Slowly I nodded.

‘Your target will be in New York tomorrow. You’ll have a partner in your hunt; a woman who’s a wizard at finding people who don’t want to be found, she’s gifted. And motivated, just like you.’ Anna gave a smug laugh, she sounded like a bird chirping. ‘So. Get to New York, find him and kill him.’

‘I need a guarantee that you will give me Daniel.’

She pulled a photo from her jacket and slid it across the table to me.

I knew it was Daniel. I knew it just like a soldier long separated from his child, by distance and normality, gets a picture and can see both himself and his wife in the baby’s face. He was wrapped in a blue blanket, green eyes looking up at the camera, not a smile on his face but he wasn’t crying, intrigued with the contraption above his head that was taking his picture. One arm reaching up, his mouth a toothless curl, cheeks full and fat. He looked good. He looked loved. Thin, blond hair crowned his head, like mine when I was a baby before it darkened, like his mother’s.

I gritted my teeth.

‘Now. When you’ve killed the target, and Daniel is returned to you, we are done. You don’t keep coming after us. You don’t help the CIA or the FBI or anyone else in pursuing us. You retire from the grand game. Go be a good daddy.’

‘I want the protocol for the exchange.’

‘When the target is dead, you will phone a number that I give you. When we have confirmed that you’ve completed your side of the bargain, then the child will be left, with a note with your contact information, at a church. A DNA test will confirm that the child is yours. Simple.’

‘No. You’re asking me to trust you far too much.’

‘You do not have a choice, Sam.’

‘If I can’t kill or find the target?’

She made a slow little wave with her hand. ‘Then I guess you’ll have that picture of him as your only memory. Would you like to keep it? Put it under your pillow?’

‘If you hurt or sell my son, I’ll kill you.’

‘Shut up. Do you really think you should threaten me right now? He could get by with nine toes as easily as ten.’

My mind went blank, in the way not of shock but of the way of calculation. I didn’t believe in a truce, not now. They were not going to threaten my child and go unpunished. But I didn’t let the decision show on my face.

‘So. Who is this target you want dead?’

She slid another photo from her jacket to me. ‘Him. His name is Jin Ming. At least that’s the name he used. I think it’s an assumed name.’

I studied the face. I recognized him, although I’d only seen him for a few moments. ‘I think you’ve made a serious mistake.’

Las Vegas

‘You want me to kill a dead man.’ I shook my head.

‘I hope you’re better at killing someone than finding a pulse. He’s not dead.’

I hadn’t had but a moment to look at him, he’d been sadly caught in the crossfire between Piet and his thugs and August’s CIA team and he looked dead enough to me. But I was running from the CIA then, and desperate to get Piet, the one surviving smuggler out of harm’s way, where I could put him to use – Piet had been my sole link to Edward, the kidnapper of my wife and my son. So I’d made a mistake. ‘Who exactly is this Jin Ming?’

‘A graduate student from Hong Kong attending the Delft University of Technology, focusing on computer sciences.’

‘And he’s a threat to you. He’s just a geek, a kid.’

‘His age is irrelevant. You’re going to find him and kill him before he surrenders to the CIA. You have two days.’

Jin Ming had walked in with August and the rest of the CIA team. If he wanted to turn against Novem Soles, would he turn to August? Perhaps this was why Anna was eager to use me. I could get close to August, and therefore close to Jin Ming.

‘Why hasn’t he surrendered to them already?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know. He set up a meeting with the CIA in two days. In New York. So get there and kill him.’

‘He has the goods on you. Poor, poor you.’

‘And we have the goods on you, Sam. Your child.’

I shut up.

‘Kill him before that meeting so it never happens and he never passes on whatever information he has. You do that, you get your son back. You don’t, your son is gone forever.’ She slid an iPhone to me. ‘This is yours. You do not tell anyone what you are doing. Anyone.’

Between her threat of a bomb in the club and my son, she had me pinned. I hate being pinned. Really, really hate it.

‘I’m going to leave now.’ She held up the remote control, another iPhone, with a call number selected. ‘You do not follow me. If you do, I call the cell phone attached to the C-4 and we have bits and pieces of drunken dancers landing in the parking lot. The signal has a five-mile range.’ She kept her thumb right above the number. One tap and we were all done.

‘Goodbye, Anna,’ I said. ‘I’ll see you very soon.’

‘No, you will never see me again. Do your job, earn your son, and then go on your way.’ She stood. ‘Don’t test that I’m bluffing.’ She moved toward the front door and a drunken guy bumped into her and for one moment I thought her thumb would hit the screen. She recovered and she pushed roughly by the drunk. I saw her go past the bouncer and out into the desert-cool night.

I ran toward the back of the club as Mila zoomed down the stairs. ‘Evacuate,’ I called to her. ‘Right now.’ Anna didn’t want me dead, but I couldn’t risk that there was a bomb here in a bar full of innocent people. Mila sprinted toward the DJ’s stand and before I reached the ladies’ room the lights were up and her voice boomed out over the loudspeakers, the music silenced.

‘People, hello, attention please. Please move to the exits in an orderly fashion. We need to clear the building immediately. There is no danger, no fire, but please move outside and across the street.’

I heard groans of dismay, but the staff moved quickly through the crowd, herding them.

I busted into the ladies’ room. Three women at the mirror, fixing make-up.

‘Hey, get the hell out of here!’ one turned and screamed at me, fueled by Cosmopolitans.

‘Evacuating the building, out now.’ There were six women total in the room and I hustled them out fast.

Where would she have put it?

The ladies’ room boasted a mirror edged with a fake lasso to continue the canyon theme. Stars to duplicate the night sky glittered on the tiled ceiling. I looked in each stall. Nothing. The air vents? It would have taken her minutes to unfasten the grates and put the bomb in; she would have been noticed, with a steady stream of customers.