David Morrell - Burnt Sienna

In misty morning sunlight, the thin-faced waiter narrowed his disapproving eyes as Malone and Sienna made their way among the sidewalk tables toward him. Early customers peered up from their coffee and frowned. Malone imagined what he looked like, his clothes rumpled, his cheeks unshaven, his lips and upper left cheek scabbed and swollen. Some homeless people look better than I do, he thought. I bet that’s what the waiter thinks I am. He probably figures I want a handout. Although Malone’s nostrils were too accustomed to the smell for him to notice it, he was also sure that he reeked of smoke from the helicopter crash, and sweat, and fear.

Thank God, Sienna looks better, he thought. In fact, even though her clothes, too, were rumpled and her makeup had worn off, she looked terrific. A few strokes from a comb she’d borrowed from him had given her hair a sheen. Her tan skin glowed. No matter how bad she felt, Malone sensed it was impossible for her to look bad.

“Monsieur.” The waiter raised his hands to keep Malone at a distance. Although his French was too quick for Malone to understand it, the gist was clear. The café had standards. It would be better if Malone went somewhere else.

Sienna didn’t give him a chance to finish. Her hurried question to him included a word that sounded like proprietor . The waiter’s reply, accompanied by gestures, suggested that the proprietor wasn’t necessary to deal with this problem.

Sienna turned to Malone. “Do you remember the owner’s name?”

“Pierre Benét.”

The boss’s name made the waiter pay closer attention. Then Sienna told the waiter Malone’s name, pointing at him as she did, adding something in French that might have been “Your boss is expecting us.”

The effect was immediate. The waiter jerked his head back. A torrent of words from him left Sienna looking shocked.

“What is it?” Malone asked. “What’s he saying?”

“They know who you are, but they weren’t expecting us.”

“What?”

“The operation was canceled.”

“Jesus, not another screwup.”

“Worse than that. They think you’re dead.”

“Chase, this is terrible! I can’t tell you how rotten I feel about this!” Jeb said. It was twelve hours later. They were in an apartment above the café, where Jeb, out of breath from having charged up the stairs, looked heavier than the last time Malone had seen him, his blocky face redder than usual. “I was in Washington when I heard. I got here as soon as possible. I don’t want you to think I left you hanging.”

“It occurred to me.”

“Christ.” Jeb slammed his hands against his legs. “Buddy, we’ve been through a lot together. You saved my life. I swear to you – I’d never knowingly fail to back you up. Have they been taking care of you?”

Malone pointed toward a stack of used cups, glasses, and plates on a counter. “Whatever you said to them on the phone, they’ve been coming up every hour, it seems, with food and coffee.”

“My God, your face. What happened to it?”

“You should have seen how bad it looked before I got cleaned up.” Malone explained how he’d received the injuries.

“The bastard.”

“I can think of stronger ways to say that.”

“And what about…” Jeb turned toward Sienna. Malone had introduced her as soon as Jeb had entered the room, but since then, Jeb’s apologies had taken up most of the conversation. He seemed self-conscious, as if trying not to stare at her beauty. “Are you hurt?”

“No.” Sienna assessed him. “But after what happened, I’m not exactly filled with confidence.”

“I don’t blame you for thinking I don’t know my job. Please, listen to me for a minute.” Jeb ran a flustered hand through his short blond hair. “Chase, after you picked that fight with Bellasar at Sotheby’s, you disappeared from the face of the earth. The last time anybody saw you was when Bellasar jabbed you with his ring and his men dragged you out of Sotheby’s.”

Sienna hadn’t heard the details of the confrontation. She leaned forward, troubled.

“We know you were driven away in Bellasar’s limo. And after that – poof. Two days later, a body too mangled to identify – I’m talking no fingers and no teeth – was found floating in the East River. The face had been burned with a blowtorch.”

Sienna paled.

“It was dressed like you. It had your height and weight. It had a Parker Meridian room key in its bomber jacket pocket, the same hotel where you were staying. You can understand why we made assumptions.”

“Except Bellasar’s men had already picked up my luggage and checked me out,” Malone said. “When you learned I wasn’t registered there any longer, it should have been obvious the body wasn’t mine.”

“The problem is, nobody checked you out of your room.”

“What?”

“You were still listed as a guest. Your clothes and things were still in your room when we went there.”

“Somebody’s, but not mine. My bag was on Bellasar’s jet. Did you bother to compare the hair samples on those clothes with ones at my home on Cozumel? Did you try to match DNA samples from the body -”

“With what ? Chase, your home doesn’t exist anymore! After you left, the bulldozers leveled it. Trucks hauled the pieces away.”

For a moment, Malone was speechless. “But Bellasar told me the bulldozers had stopped. He told me he was going to restore…” His voice became hoarse. “Just like he told me his men checked me out of my hotel room.”

“Even then, I didn’t give up,” Jeb said. “I tried to find out if anybody had seen you get on Bellasar’s jet. No luck. I checked with the airport authorities at Nice to see if they had any record that you’d entered the country. No luck there, either. I waited for a signal from you. Nothing. It’s been five weeks, Chase. For God’s sake, we had a wake for you. I never expected to see you again. I did my best to convince my supervisor not to do it, but he finally pulled the plug.”

Malone peered down at his hands.

“I can understand if you’re pissed at me,” Jeb said, “but what would you have done that I didn’t? I swear to you – it wasn’t anybody’s fault.”

Jeb’s suit was rumpled from the long flight. His eyes were swollen from lack of sleep. His burly frame looked puffy from sitting too long.

“It’s okay,” Malone said.

“Really, I want to put this behind us, Chase. I don’t want you thinking I let you down.”

“I’m not. Everything’s fine. We’re back on track.”

“You’re positive? No hard feelings?”

“None.”

“But in the meantime, my husband’s still looking for me.” Sienna’s stark tone made clear that whatever Malone felt, she herself was not reassured. “I keep worrying that he and his men are going to smash through that door any minute. How are you going to help us?”

For the first time, Jeb looked directly at her. “It’ll be my pleasure to show you I can do my job.”

After nightfall, twenty miles east of Nice, a van stopped along the narrow coastal road. Malone and Sienna got out, accompanied by Jeb and three other armed men. As the van drove away, they clambered down a rocky slope to where a motorized rubber raft waited in a cove. A half mile offshore, they boarded a small freighter and set out for Corsica.

“Two days from now, you’ll be transferred to a U.S. aircraft carrier on maneuvers in the region,” Jeb said after using a scrambler-equipped radio to verify the schedule. “From there, you’ll be flown to a base in Italy, and from there” – he spread his hands – “home.”