Джеймс Паттерсон - Private Rogue

“I’ve found a satellite phone,” Floyd said, joining me in the cockpit.

I recited one of the few numbers I knew by heart, and he dialed.

“Go ahead,” he said, handing me the phone.

He took the controls. I removed my headset and held the phone to my ear. I heard a long and distant ringing tone.

“Hello?” Justine said. Her voice sounded weak and strained and I knew from that one word that she thought I was dead. “Hello? Who is this?”

“It’s me, Jus,” I replied.

There was nothing but silence and I didn’t know if the line had cut out.

“Justine?”

“Jack?” she replied in disbelief. “Jack?”

“Yeah. It’s me,” I said, and felt a lump rise in my throat. “I guess Dinara and Feo thought we’d been—”

“They said you were dead,” she interrupted tearfully. “I thought you were gone.”

“I’m not,” I responded. “We managed to escape.”

“We? Is Joshua Floyd with you?”

“Yes,” I said. “He’s with me. We’re coming home.”

“Is Beth there?” Floyd yelled at me above the sound of the chopper.

“Did you hear that?” I asked.

Another pause, but this time I knew the line hadn’t gone dead because I could hear Justine sobbing.

“Jus?”

“She’s gone, Jack,” she replied. “And the children too. They were taken.”

“I see,” I said flatly. “Can you connect us to Dinara?”

“Uh-huh,” Justine said, before putting me on hold.

“Is she there?” Floyd asked.

I shook my head. “Justine isn’t at the safe house.”

His smile fell. Could he sense something was wrong? I felt terrible lying to him, but until I had the full details I wasn’t going to share the bad news. It would only lead to worry, and there was nothing either of us could do about it from here.

“Jack?” Dinara sounded astonished.

“Dinara,” I replied. “You bailed on us.”

“I’m so sorry, Jack. We saw you...” Her voice trailed off.

“I’m kidding,” I said. “You did the right thing. Where are you?”

“Kabul,” she replied. “Getting ready to go back to Moscow at first light. Where are you?”

“Kom Valley, near Kamdesh,” I said. “Heading your way. Wait there. We’re a couple hours out. We’ll meet you at the airport.”

“OK,” Dinara replied. “I’m so glad you’re alive, Jack.”

“Me too,” I scoffed. “Justine, are you still on the line?”

“Yes,” she replied.

“Can you arrange transportation home from Kabul?” I asked.

“With pleasure.”

“And send Dinara a full report on what’s happened in my absence, so I can get up to speed,” I said carefully, so Floyd wouldn’t become suspicious.

“Absolutely,” Justine replied.

“I’ll see you soon, Dinara,” I said.

“We’ll be waiting for the luckiest men in Afghanistan,” Dinara responded before hanging up.

“Jack,” Justine began. “I... When I thought you were... I realized how much you...” She was having trouble getting the words out.

“I know,” I said, when it became clear she couldn’t continue. “I love you too.”

“Uh-huh,” was all she could manage.

“I’ll call when we get to Kabul,” I said.

I hung up, handed the phone to Floyd, and put on my radio headset.

“Everything OK?” he asked, his voice tinny in the headset.

I nodded and gave him a thumbs-up. I hated being less than entirely honest, but I needed to find out exactly what had happened to Beth Singer and the children before I could figure out how to get them back.

Justine stared at her phone. She couldn’t believe what had just happened. Had she imagined it? She went to her call list and found the most recent number. She checked the duration of the call. She definitely hadn’t imagined it.

Jack was alive.

She jumped off the bed and punched the air. She’d never believed people did that in real life, but she was fizzing with energy and had to find some way to release it. A little over five minutes ago she’d been lying on her bed in the darkest of moods, mourning the loss of the most important person in her life, and now the world had burst into new and vibrant possibility with the news of his survival.

She went to the window. She wasn’t sure if she ran or hopped or jumped. It didn’t matter. She was buzzing. She’d never felt like this before. It was as though she had been reborn. She’d lived another life, a grim existence of loss and trauma, and it had been destroyed by a single phone call. She pulled back the drapes to reveal the Manhattan skyline illuminated against the dark winter’s evening sky. She hit the glass with her palms, and pounded out a little celebratory rhythm. She was on the forty-second floor of the Langham Hotel. The people on Fifth Avenue beneath her looked tiny. She felt a moment of pity because whatever grief or heartbreak they’d suffered in life would be with them always and they’d never know what it was like to have those feelings lifted from them.

Then she suddenly thought of the families of Roni Alvarez and Jim Taft. She knew for a fact their loved ones would never have any respite from their grief. And then there were Beth, Danny and Maria, lost to the evil men who’d murdered Roni and Taft. Those sad thoughts brought her back to earth and all her energy became newly focused — she needed to find Floyd’s family.

She slipped on her shoes, grabbed her key card and left the room. She took the stairs down to the thirty-seventh floor and walked the corridor until she found room 3708. She knocked, and Mo-bot’s voice came from the other side of the door.

“Who is it?”

“Justine.”

She heard movement. The door opened to reveal Mo-bot with a pair of half-moon glasses perched on top of her head. She looked beleaguered and depressed, but as she registered Justine’s expression, her own changed.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” she said. “He’s alive, isn’t he?”

Justine cried with joy and stepped forward to hug Mo-bot. “Yes! He’s alive. He just called me.”

The older woman squeezed her tight. “Thank God,” she said.

When Justine stepped back, she saw tears in Mo-bot’s eyes.

“Come in,” she said. “Tell me what happened.”

Justine followed Mo-bot into a room much like her own, a large suite with a corner view of the city. It had a living room, separate bedroom and large bathroom. Mo-bot had set up her laptop on the desk in the living room and her workstation was covered in print outs and snack wrappers.

“Sorry the place is a mess,” she said. “I comfort eat when I’m depressed. So, how did he do it?”

“I don’t know,” Justine replied. “I was so stunned to hear his voice, I can’t even remember what he said really. It was all a blur.”

“Knowing him, he probably swallowed the rocket,” Mo-bot chuckled.

Justine was glad to see her laugh. A great weight had been lifted from both of them.

“He wants a report on what happened to Beth,” Justine said. “Joshua Floyd is with him.”

Mo-bot’s smile fell. “Cops don’t have anything. Nor do the feds. And we don’t either. Whoever these guys are, they’re pros. I think Russian intelligence. Sci is at Federal Plaza trying to get access to the ballistics reports, but my guess is it will be fresh steel — previously unused guns.”

“Why don’t we go through everything?” Justine suggested. “It would be useful to do that anyway. We might see something we’ve overlooked.”

Mo-bot shrugged. “OK. If Lazarus wants a report, Lazarus gets a report. People who come back from the dead can have whatever they want. It’s the law.”

Justine grinned, but she still couldn’t quite believe it.