Patterson, James - Alex Cross 5 - Pop Goes the Weasel

At the far end of the courtyard, he spotted a man and a woman in evening clothes. They were loitering near a white stucco portico strewn with flowers. He decided they were Jones's people. They had staked out the hotel, after all. They were here for him and he was honored.

The male glanced his way, and Shafer abruptly lowered his head. There was nothing they could do to stop or detain him. He'd committed no crime they could prove. He wasn't wanted by the police. No, he was a free man.

So Shafer walked toward them at a leisurely pace, as if he hadn't seen them. He whistled 'Yellowbird'.

He looked up when he was a few yards away from the pair. 'I'm the one you're waiting for. I'm Geoffrey Shafer. Welcome to the game.'

He pulled a Smith Wesson 9mm semiautomatic and fired twice.

The woman cried out and grabbed the left side of her chest. Bright-red blood was already staining her sea-green dress. Her eyes showed confusion, shock and then rolled back into her forehead.

The male agent had a dark hole where his left eye had been. Shafer knew the man was dead before his head struck the courtyard floor with a loud, satisfying smack.

He hadn't lost anything over the years. Shafer hurried toward the White Suite and Conqueror. The gunshots certainly would have been heard. They wouldn't expect him to run straight into the trap they'd set. But here he was.

Two maids were pushing a squeaking cleanup cart out of the White Suite. Had they just turned down Conqueror's bed? Left the fat man a box of chocolate mints to nibble?

'Get the hell out of here!' he yelled, and raised his gun. 'Go on now! Run for your lives.' The Jamaican maids took off as if they had just seen the devil himself. They would tell their children that they had.

Shafer burst in the front door of the suite, and there was Oliver Highsmith freewheeling his chair across the freshly scrubbed floor.

'Oliver, it's you,' Shafer said. 'I do believe I've caught the dreaded Covent Garden killer. You did those killings, didn't you? Fancy that. Game's over, Oliver.'

At the same time, Shafer thought, watch him closely. Be careful with Conqueror.

Oliver Highsmith stopped moving, then slowly, rather nimbly, turned his wheelchair to face Shafer. A face-to-face meeting. This was good. The best. Highsmith had controlled Bayer and Whitehead from London, when they were all agents. The original game, The Four Horsemen, had been his idea, a diversion as he eased into retirement. 'Our silly little fantasy game,' he always called it.

He studied Shafer, cold-eyed and measuring. He was bright; an egghead, but a genius, or so Bayer and Whitehead claimed.

'My dear fellow, we're your friends. The only ones you have now. We understand your problem. Let's talk things through, Geoffrey.'

Shafer laughed at the fat man's pathetic lies, his superior and condescending attitude, his nerve. 'That's not what George Bayer told me. Why, he said you were going to murder me. Hell of a way to treat a friend.'

Highsmith didn't blink, didn't falter. 'We're not alone here, Geoff. They're at the hotel. The Security Service team is in the grounds. They must have followed you.'

'And you, and Bayer, and Whitehead. I know all that, Oliver. I met a couple of crackerjack agents outside. Shot 'em dead. That's why I have to hurry up, can't tarry. The game's on a clock now. Lots of ways to lose.'

'We have to talk, Geoff.'

'Talk, talk, talk.' Shafer shook his head, frowned, then barked out a laugh. 'No, there's nothing for us to talk about. Talk is such an overrated bore. I learned to kill in the field, and I like it much more than talking. No, I actually love it to death.'

'You are mad,' Highsmith exclaimed, his grayish-blue eyes widening with fear. Finally he understood who Shafer was; he wasn't intellectualizing anymore. He felt it in his gut.

'No actually, I'm not insane. I know precisely what I'm doing, always have, always will. I know the difference between good and evil. Anyway, look who's talking, the Rider on the White Horse.'

Shafer moved quickly toward Highsmith. 'This isn't much of a fight - just the way I was taught to perform in Asia. You're going to die, Oliver. Isn't that a stunning thought? Still think this is a bloody fantasy game?'

Suddenly Highsmith jumped to his feet. Shafer wasn't surprised. He knew he couldn't have committed the murders in London from a wheelchair. Highsmith was close to six feet and obese, but surprisingly quick for his size. His arms and hands were massive.

Shafer was simply faster. He struck Highsmith with the butt of his gun and Conqueror went crashing down on one knee. Shafer bludgeoned him a second time, then a third, and Highsmith dropped flat on the floor. He groaned loudly, and slobbered blood and spit. Shafer kicked the small of his back, kicked a knee, kicked Highsmith's face.

Shafer bent and put the gun barrel against Highsmith's broad forehead. He could hear the distant sound of running footsteps slapping down the hall. Too bad, they were coming for him. Hurry, hurry.

'They're too late,' he said to Conqueror. 'No one can save you. Except me, Conqueror. What's the play? Counsel me. Should I save the whale?'

'Please, Geoff, no. You can't just kill me. We can still help each other.'

'I'd love to stretch this out, but I really have to dash. I'm throwing the dice. In my mind. Oh, bad news, Oliver. The game is up. You just lost.'

He inserted the barrel of his gun into Highsmith's pulpy right ear and fired. The gunshot blew Conqueror's gray matter all over the room, and Shafer's only regret was that he couldn't have tortured Oliver Highsmith much, much longer than he had.

Then Shafer was running away, and he realized something that actually surprised him. He had something to live for. This was a wonderful, wonderful game.

He wanted to live.

?CHAPTER One Hundred and Fifteen

Sampson and I sprinted toward the secluded wing of the hotel where Oliver Highsmith had his suite. There had been gunshots, but we couldn't be everywhere at once. We'd heard the pistol reports all the way on the other side of the Jamaica Inn.

I wasn't prepared for the bloody massacre scene we found. Two English agents were down in the courtyard. I'd worked with them both, just as I'd worked side by side with Patsy Hampton.

Jones and another agent, in addition to a team of local detectives, were already crowded into Highsmith's suite. The room was abuzz. Everything had turned to chaos and carnage in a burst of homicidal madness.

'Shafer went through two of my people to get here,' Jones said in an angry voice strained with tension and sadness. He was already smoking a cigarette. 'He came in shooting, took down Laura and Gwynn. Highsmith is dead, too. We haven't found George Bayer.'

I knelt and quickly checked the damage to Oliver Highsmith's skull. It wasn't subtle. He'd been shot at point-blank range and the wound was massive. I knew from Jones that Shafer had resented the senior man's intelligence, and now he'd blown out his brains. 'I told you he liked to kill. He has to do this, Andrew. He can't stop. 'Whitehead!' I said. 'The end of the game.'

?CHAPTER One Hundred and Sixteen

We drove faster than the narrow, twisting road safely allowed, barreling toward James Whitehead's home. It wasn't far.

We passed a road sign that read: MALLARD'S BEACH -SAN ANTONIO.

Sampson and I were quiet, lost in our own thoughts. I kept thinking of Christine, couldn't stop the images from coming. We have her. Was that still true?

I didn't know, and only Shafer, or possibly Whitehead, could give me the answer. I wanted to keep both of them alive if I could. Everything about the island, the exotic smells and sights, reminded me of Christine. I tried, but I couldn't imagine a good conclusion to any of this.

We headed toward the beach and soon we were skimming past private houses and a few very large estates. Some of the estates had long, winding driveways that stretched a hundred yards or more to the main house.