The Darkest Day

FORTY-EIGHT

He was silent for a long time. He thought about the book and the safe house and the coded message and believing he had tracked Raven to the museum. A trail left by Halleck’s people to take him to a certain place at a certain time.

You’re coming with us, the guy in the blue suit had said. At that moment Victor had thought the team had wanted to take Victor into their custody because of his association with Raven. Now, he realised that must have always been part of Halleck’s plan.

‘It doesn’t make sense,’ Victor said. ‘Halleck couldn’t have known for sure I would want to meet him; he couldn’t have known I would come after you nor how I would go about it. I found one of your Dominican cigarette stubs in Prague. It led me to Marte.’

‘I always knew Jean Claud would sell me out,’ Raven said. ‘But I could never bring myself to kill him merely as a precaution. I guess scaring someone only works for so long. He gave you my aliases?’

‘Yes, and then —’

He stopped himself because he knew the rest. He had passed the information on to Halleck, who had told Victor about the apartment.

He shook his head, annoyed at himself. ‘He gave me this address and I didn’t question it. I came straight here. You were right, I did set myself up.’

‘Don’t be too harsh on yourself,’ Raven said. ‘Halleck is a master at this kind of thing. He fooled me for years.’

‘I should have known better. I do know better.’

‘Life is one long lesson. We never know how much we learned until we’re facing the end.’

He considered this, then said, ‘But I could have killed you in Prague. He wanted me to kill you in Prague. If I had, I would never have been here now.’

She looked at him with some sympathy. He never liked such looks. She said, ‘Then he wouldn’t have used you. He would have used someone else. Maybe one of his own men even. But, he didn’t need to, did he? He had you. You made it easy for him by trying to find me. You gave yourself to him. You gave him a perfect patsy: a professional killer coming to New York of his own accord.’

‘I told Guerrero and Wallinger not to judge me on my recent actions. I told them I was usually a lot better at this. Maybe I’m not. Maybe I’ve simply been lucky until now. And I don’t even believe in luck.’

Raven stood up from the folding chair and retrieved the paperback novel from the floor. She thumbed through it. ‘He didn’t make it easy for you. That’s why you fell for it. If at any stage it didn’t feel right; if it felt easy, you would have smelled a rat. Put that down to Halleck’s competence, not any incompetence of your own.’

He shook his head again. ‘It still doesn’t make sense. Even giving me this address he couldn’t guarantee I would be in the city for the day of the blackout.’

She looked at him like he was missing something obvious, which he realised he was.

‘Ah,’ Victor said. ‘The blackout happened today because I’m in New York.’ She nodded. ‘And the museum… Another good trick. It’s a good location for a clandestine meeting. I didn’t even suspect a trap.’

‘I told you: Halleck knows exactly what he’s doing. He’s been operating for a long time.’

‘If you hadn’t been there to warn me I might be dead by now.’ He paused. ‘I guess I should thank you.’

‘Only if you want to.’

He swallowed and said, ‘Thank you.’

She bowed her head a little. ‘You’re welcome.’ She looked around the apartment. ‘We should make a move. Even with the NYPD overloaded, we’ve probably outstayed our welcome.’

Victor looked around the apartment too and nodded. ‘I thought the camping gear was here because you liked to keep your safe house free of anything identifiable, but it serves his narrative, doesn’t it? He’s had a huge crew following me around the city. Just to observe, one of them told me. But also to record, no doubt. Someone will have photographed me entering this building. After the attack, this will be my apartment where I planned it.’ He glanced at Wallinger’s corpse. ‘And these two told me they were looking for you. They said you were a terrorist. But they were here to add to the deception. They could have testified after the fact to my presence. When I came back here, Guerrero must have known the plan to grab me at the museum had failed so she tried to take care of things herself. Wallinger was obviously not part of Halleck’s network. He thought he was just doing his job.’

Raven shook her head. ‘That’s not how Halleck operates. Guerrero wouldn’t have known what was going down. Only a few key people will be in the know. I was one of them.’

Victor ran through the two conversations he’d had with the two Homeland Security agents, especially the second one before Guerrero attacked him. ‘Then it was because I said your code name. She didn’t know about the museum. She didn’t know about Halleck’s crew following me. But she did know about you. That I did too marked me for death and made her partner collateral damage.’

‘I did say I’m not very popular. If you’d have trusted me and not said my name to test your theories then your shirt would be dry and we wouldn’t have two dead federal agents here. Even if we stop the attack, you’re still fucked.’

He frowned. ‘I don’t like profanity.’

She laughed. ‘But killing people is okay?’

‘I never said I was consistent. And there is no we. I appreciate your assistance at the museum, but you’re on your own. I’m no fan of bombs and the carnage they cause but I’m not staying in this city a second longer. The authorities were on to me within moments of leaving that museum. I almost didn’t escape. Every cop and federal agent in the city will be looking for me.’

‘They were on to you so fast because Halleck gave you up to them.’

‘Of course,’ Victor said. ‘Which is why I need to get out of here.’

‘If you run and I don’t stop it on my own then you’ll be a fugitive with half the Western world looking for you.’

Victor said, ‘That’s pretty much my life right now.’

‘Even a mercenary like you cares about taking the blame for an act of terrorism. And however much you’re a wanted man now, that’s only going to rise exponentially afterwards.’

‘Of course,’ he said again. ‘On both counts.’

‘How are you going to keep working when your face is plastered on every news bulletin?’

He didn’t answer.

‘And how are you going to avoid all those enemies of yours when you’re the world’s most wanted man?’

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘You make a compelling pitch. What are you proposing? That we work together to stop Halleck setting me up?’

‘That’s a somewhat selfish way of looking at it,’ Raven said. ‘I like to think of it as we work together to stop a major act of terrorism.’

‘Semantics. How do we stop Halleck? All we know is that he’s going to set off a bomb and the blackout is helping him do that. We don’t know where it is or where he is.’

She said, ‘The cops are looking for us, right? Especially you. We make sure you come to the attention of New York’s finest. It’ll be called in. Cell phone towers are down, but cop radios will still work. Halleck’s people will be piggybacking on the airwaves or they’ll be informed by one of his people on the inside. He’ll know where you are five seconds after the cops do. We don’t need to find Halleck. We just have to make sure his people find us.’

‘Then what?’

‘Isn’t it obvious? We take one alive. By now they’ll have to know more. They’ll know where Halleck is or where the bomb is. If we’re lucky, that’ll be the same place.’

‘That sounds too much like guesswork to me.’

She shrugged. ‘What choice do we have?’

‘You mean the choice beyond putting ourselves on the radar of the NYPD, the FBI and Halleck’s people at the same time?’

She nodded.

‘If we use ourselves as bait when the whole city is looking for us then it’s more than likely we’re going to get into a situation we can’t control. The cops outnumber us by a factor of five thousand. They have helicopters. They have SWAT teams. And that’s without FBI and Homeland Security and Halleck’s people. It’s too much of a risk. It can’t be done.’

Raven gave him a look and held up Wallinger’s car keys.

Victor raised an eyebrow. ‘It’s so ridiculous it might actually work.’