David Morrell - The naked edge

"Fossilized ivory," Carl's voice said from the phone.

Cavanaugh smiled slightly in victory.

"Lance taught us nothing should die in order to be used to make a knife," Carl's voice said.

The agent in contact with the communications center gestured to indicate they were tracking the signal from the third phone.

"Mastodon ivory," Cavanaugh said. "From Alaska, right? I like the way you put black epoxy over the main part of the blade and then let the edge of the blade retain its natural shiny metallic look. Contrasts beautifully with the ivory."

"Coming from you, that's high praise, Aaron."

"Nothing should die in order to be used to make a knife?"

"You heard Lance say that often enough."

"So the killing's justified only after the knife is made?"

"Hey, don't get moralistic, Aaron. In Delta Force, you did your share of work with a blade. Did you figure out why I left you the khukri?"

"A threat?"

"Well, let's just say a warning." Carl's voice was faint. "For all you know, I'm watching you right now. Maybe I've got a rifle trained on you. Maybe I could blow you to hell at this very moment."

"I doubt it, Carl. You're blocks away. You made sure this phone registered the number you're using. You want us to track the signal you're using, but all we'll find is another set of phones taped together. Are you enjoying yourself?"

"Just like when we were kids and pretended to be soldiers hunting one another in those woods at the bottom of our street."

"But we're not kids any longer."

"Exactly. Do you remember the last time we were in New Orleans? The blast we had, drinking, listening to jazz all night? Except for the club behind you, there's hardly any place that has jazz anymore. The bar down the street features karaoke, for God's sake. When I was there earlier, some kid with rings in her nose was screeching the lyrics to 'Love Shack.' The jazz clubs were turned into strip joints and sex-toy shops. Pitiful. This town'll destroy your memories if you don't get out as fast as you can. Ease off. Go back to Wyoming."

"Not much there for me now. You burned my house, remember?"

"Rebuild it. Occupy your time with something constructive. Stay out of my business. Aaron, do you want to make a bet?"

"What do I get if I win?"

"I'll stop whatever I'm doing if you can tell me what's the most expensive knife in the world."

"Then I win, Carl. The most expensive knife is the solid gold replica of King Tut's dagger that Buster Warenski made."

"Wrong," Carl's voice said.

"Come on," Cavanaugh said. "When Buster made that knife in the 1980s, it was valued at fifty thousand dollars. Two years ago, the estimate was raised to a half million. But then the collector said it wasn't for sale at any price."

"Yeah, Buster did a great job on that dagger. But it's still not the most expensive knife in the world. You want to know what is?"

"Sure, Carl. Go ahead and tell me."

"The knife that costs you your life."

Carl made the statement sound so final that Cavanaugh had the sense that the conversation was over.

"Whatever you're doing," Cavanaugh said, "stop it. You've got so many people looking for you, you can't expect to get away. Negotiate with me. What can we give you to make this stop?"

The phone's subtle electronic hiss stretched on and on.

"Carl?"

Suddenly, Cavanaugh heard voices coming through the phone: angry men cursing.

The agent in contact with the communications center lowered his phone and said, "They tracked the signal to the Garden District. A team found two phones taped together in a flower bed outside one of those old mansions."

"Both phones are active?"

"Yes."

"Sure. Carl did it again. He relayed his voice from a further location. If I go there, he'll start talking to me through another relay phone. He'll lead me all over the city. A cemetery or the river will probably be next."

"Anything to distract you from trying to stop whatever's going to happen tomorrow," Jamie said.

"Oh, we're going to stop it."

As a police car hurried Cavanaugh and Jamie through the busy night, he noted increasing signs of the trouble that was coming. More law-enforcement officers on the streets. More barricades. In several parks, large groups of demonstrators were gathered, some of them sprawled on sleeping bags, others gesturing in animated discussions. Distant sirens wailed.

Jamie looked at her watch. "Almost one o'clock. Not much time."

They reached the Delta Queen Hotel, one of several on Canal Street. The district's proximity to the convention center made it a logical place for many of the delegates to stay, although Cavanaugh hated the idea of so many influential people being grouped so close to each other.

He and Jamie showed their ID to guards and ran past barricades into the ornate hotel's lobby. Next to the check-in desk, the concierge directed them to a banquet room on the hotel's second floor. They ran up a staircase and along a thickly carpeted corridor to where they showed their ID to more guards and entered the brightly lit command post for Global Protective Services.

Tables filled the huge room. Computers and monitors seemed everywhere, phones ringing, printers whirring, dozens of agents working to keep up with the massive influx of information. Outside the hotel, more sirens wailed.

For several weeks prior to the conference, GPS advance teams had traveled to New Orleans and studied the security layout of this and other hotels where clients were staying. They assessed possible routes to the conference as well as to various tourist spots that the delegates would insist on visiting. The agents took photographs. They made diagrams of streets and the room patterns of floors and suites. They created time charts of how long it took to get from one building to another. They did background checks on limousine services and arranged for armored cars to be available. They hired guards to make certain the limos weren't tampered with and that the guards inspected each vehicle on a regular schedule. They arranged for medical personnel to be on call and made detailed notes about how to reach the nearest hospitals. These and numerous other preparations were the hidden part of the protective world, each security measure made to look effortless when in fact everything was the result of intense planning.

Amid the organized commotion, a tall woman looked up from a printout she studied. A former Marine who was also a former member of the Defense Intelligence Agency, she wore dark slacks and a dark blouse that could be made to look formal or casual, depending on the type of client she needed to blend with. Her red hair was cut short. Her strong features had only faint makeup and were tight with fatigue. Looking as if she welcomed the distraction, she approached Cavanaugh and Jamie.

"I hear you're the new boss."

"Just my bad luck," Cavanaugh said. "Jamie, this is Dawn Finch, the best advance agent we have."

"Flattery, flattery."

"Dawn, this is my wife, Jamie."

"Word came my way about that, also. You're full of surprises."

"Let's hope tomorrow doesn't bring surprises."

"Here's how it lays out." Dawn led them to various charts mounted on a wall.

Cavanaugh studied them. "I don't like the pattern of the choke points." He referred to the potential attack sites common to every route that the attendees would need to use.

"Yeah, the convention center's in a centralized area. The Warehouse/Arts district, Canal Street, the French Quarter. Everything's within a few blocks. No matter how we try to vary the routes, everybody has to pass through the bottlenecks here and here. Bombs and snipers are the big worry, of course. We tag-teamed with the police and the government agencies to reinforce security at those points, keep the protestors back, occupy roofs, watch for movement at windows, that sort of thing."