David Morrell - The Covenant Of The Flame

'But if our man was already shot, why did they…?' The second man's voice cracked.

'Set fire to him?' The chameleon grimaced. 'No doubt, to make an example. To demoralize us.'

'In that case, they failed,' the third man said with fury. They'll pay. I'll put them in hell.'

'We all will,' the sixth man said.

'And make them pay for other things as well,' the chameleon said, his mouth tasting sour.

'You mean there's more?' The fourth man jerked upright, inadvertently banging his knees against the top of the small desk.

'Unfortunately. Last night, at the same time our operative was shot while he watched the mansion…"

Brian Hamilton set down the cellular telephone in the shadowy back seat of his silver Corniche, frowned, and leaned forward toward his bodyguard-driver. 'Steve, you heard?'

The husky, former Marine, an expert in reconnaissance, nodded firmly. 'That was Eric Chatham. You want me to drive to his home.'

'Exactly. Get me to West Falls Church as soon as possible.'

'I'm already headed toward the freeway.'

With that taken care of, Brian Hamilton slumped back and brooded. The story that Tess had told him… and the photographs she'd shown him… troubled him greatly. Whoever the man called Joseph Martin had really been, there was something he'd been hiding.

Or running from. Hamilton was sure of that. Yes. Whatever that something might be, it was as terrible as the blood-stained whip in Joseph Martin's closet and the grotesque sculpture that Tess had photographed.

Back at the mansion, Hamilton had described that photograph as weird, but the adjective understated his severe revulsion. The bas-relief statue filled him with disgust.

He bit his lip, with a deepening apprehension that Tess had become involved in something so twisted and dangerous that it might get her killed. Hadn't she said that she feared she was being followed?

Hamilton's jaw muscles hardened. Whatever was going on, he intended to use all his power, all his influence, every I.O.U. at his disposal to find out what threatened Tess and to make sure it was stopped.

After all, he owed her. For several reasons. Not the least of which was that he'd been her father's friend but had followed orders from his superiors and reluctantly sent Remington Drake to Beirut to negotiate a secret arms deal with the Christians against the Moslems. As a consequence, he'd been responsible for her father's abduction by the Moslems, Drake's torture, and eventual brutal death. It wasn't any wonder that Tess hated him. By all means, she had good reason. But if helping her and possibly saving her life would erase that hate, Brian Hamilton had all the motivation he needed, especially since her mother and he had come to an arrangement. After all, he couldn't very well have a stepdaughter who loathed him.

Continuing to brood, he noticed that his bodyguard had reached the freeway and was speeding toward Falls Church, Virginia, ten miles away. In a very few minutes, Brian Hamilton would be able to describe his problem to the director of the FBI and demand that Eric Chatham use the full resources of the Bureau to find out who Joseph Martin had been and who had killed him. As much as Hamilton owed Tess, Eric Chatham owed him , and now, by God, it was payback time.

'Sir, we might have a problem,' the bodyguard-driver said.

' What problem?' Hamilton straightened.

'It's possible we're being followed.'

His stomach suddenly cramping, Hamilton pivoted to stare through the car's back window. 'The minivan behind us?'

'Yes, sir. At first, I thought it was just a coincidence. But it's been tailing us since before we left Alexandria.'

'Lose it.'

'That's what I'm trying to do, sir.'

The Corniche sped up.

But so did the minivan.

'Persistent,' the driver said.

'I told you to lose it.'

' Where , sir? We're on a freeway, if you don't mind me pointing out the obvious. I'm doing ninety . And I don't see an exit ramp.'

'Wait a minute! It's changing lanes! It looks like it wants to pass us!' Hamilton said.

'Yes, sir. It could be… possibly… maybe I'm wrong.'

The minivan, having veered into the passing lane, increased speed and came abreast of the Corniche. But as Hamilton watched, he felt his heart lurch. On the minivan's passenger side, someone was rolling down a window.

'Look out!' Hamilton's driver blurted.

Too late.

From the open window, someone threw a bottle. The bottle had a rag stuffed into its mouth.

The rag was on fire.

'Jesus!'

The bodyguard swerved toward the freeway's gravel shoulder, frantically reducing speed, but the bottle – which must have been constructed from specially designed, brittle glass – shattered on impact against the Corniche's windshield and spewed blazing gasoline over the car.

Blinded by flames -

– on the hood! -

– and oh, Christ, on the windshield! -

– the driver tried desperately to control his steering. In the backseat, Hamilton gaped to the left, horrified to see the van streak sharply toward the Corniche. He felt the van slam brutally against the Corniche's side, slam it again, and again , and propel the Corniche off the freeway's shoulder.

Hamilton's stomach dropped. The Corniche, now completely engulfed with flames, crashed through a guardrail, soared through the air, and collided with…

Hamilton screamed. He never knew what the car hit. The sudden shocking force of the crash slammed him forward, catapulting him up, over, and beyond the front seat, walloping his skull against the dashboard.

But what the passengers in the minivan saw with calculated satisfaction was that the Corniche had impacted against a massive steel electrical tower. The collision burst the Corniche's fuel tank. A huge exploding fireball disintegrated the car and spewed pieces of flesh, bone, and metal for fifty yards in every direction, the flames gushing upward for a hundred feet. As the minivan sped onward, disappearing among traffic, its rear window reflected the spectacular pyre in the darkness beside the freeway.

The chameleon removed the folded front section of the New York Times from beneath a notepad on his clipboard. He held it up so the group could see the headline – FORMER SECRETARY OF STATE DIES IN FIERY FREEWAY DISASTER – then handed the newspaper to the second man. 'When you're finished, pass it around.'

'I've already read it. I didn't know the connection, but the moment you mentioned Brian Hamilton, I realized what you were getting at.'

'Well,' the third man said, 'I didn't have a chance to read the paper this morning. Let me see.'

One-by-one, the somber-faced men read the article.

'Fire,' the sixth man said with disgust. 'They're so in love with fire.' Lips curled, he set down the paper and studied the chameleon. 'You seem to have so many answers. What about this one. Why did they kill him?'

'I don't have answers exactly. What I do have are calculated assumptions,' the chameleon said. Tess Drake makes a sudden trip to see her mother. When she gets to the mansion in Alexandria, is it a coincidence that the former Secretary of State and current main adviser to the President just happens to be waiting there when she arrives? Not likely. I have to conclude that so important a man was summoned by the woman, that Hamilton – a friend of her dead father – was the person she primarily wanted to see and not her mother, that Tess Drake was using her late father's influence to enlist powerful help in discovering who Joseph Martin was and why he was killed.'

The third man shrugged. 'Assumptions, as you admit. However, I grant that they're logical.'