Black Star

CHAPTER 28 — RED ROSES

It was mid-afternoon and the traffic in downtown Washington was already gridlocked at the intersections. Horns blared, and pedestrians scuttled between rows of stopped automobiles.

He knew he should have telephoned, but something prevented him. If what they had to say was finished in only a few minutes, he wanted it to be face to face, not over the phone.

Half a block before G Street, he spotted what he was looking for. Ten minutes later, carrying a dozen red roses with their stems held upward, he strode into the Media One Building lobby. He took the elevator to the eighteenth floor, then entered the front office of Mutual Studios.

“Whom did you wish to see, sir?” asked the receptionist, a prim, middle-aged woman with round glasses.

“Miss Phillips. Claire Phillips.”

She looked him over, noting the Navy uniform, the motorcycle helmet under his arm. Then her gaze fixed on the roses. “Who may I say is here?”

“Sam Maxwell.”

Her face broke into a smile. “Commander Sam Maxwell? The one we’ve heard so much about?”

He nodded.

“Is Claire expecting you, Commander?”

“No.”

“Hmm.” She peered into her computer monitor. “She’s supposed to be doing an interview down at the Mall this afternoon. Shooting at—” she poked at the keyboard. “Let’s see… four-fifteen to four-twenty five. Traffic is terrible right now, but if you have a fast way to get there, you might catch her before she’s finished.”

“I have a fast way.” He turned to leave. “Thank you. You’re very kind.”

“Excuse me, Commander, but are those roses for Claire?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“You want a tip from a lady? Just give her one. Trust me, it works.”

He dropped the Harley into first gear and drove the bike up on the sidewalk. The staccato bark of the twin pipes cleared the pedestrians out of his way. Dodging a pair of roller-bladers, he veered onto the grass and motored over to where the crowd was gathered.

Ahead he could see the equipment vans and the people clustered around the cameras. On the ground were coils of cable and boxes and audio equipment. A man had a large dolly-rigged camera trained on the tall woman standing inside the ring of spectators.

She had just finished interviewing someone. He looked like a beltway type — a congressman or some administration official in a gray suit. He was walking away from the set. Behind them the Washington monument rose like a monolith against the pale blue sky.

Maxwell recognized her outfit. It was her standard choice for outdoor shoots — silk scarf, sleeveless blouse, long skirt rustling around her legs. Her chestnut hair ruffled in the breeze that blew in from the Potomac.

His heart skipped a beat.

She was speaking to the camera when she spotted him. She continued talking, but her eyes kept darting to the apparition coming toward her — a red Harley-Davidson ridden by a man in a Navy dress blue uniform. The deep-throated, blatting exhaust sound was feeding into the audio.

Heads in the crowd turned. Maxwell heard a voice boom into his ear. “What the hell do you think you’re doing? You can’t ride that thing in here.”

The voice belonged to a cop. He was a heavy-set, African-American man with a mass of wiry gray hair jutting from beneath his uniform cap.

Maxwell stopped the bike. “I’m here to see Claire Phillips.” He held up the single rose. “And to give her this.”

“Yeah, right. Get outta here or I’ll have you and the noisy damn bike hauled away to the station.”

Still watching the commotion off the set, Claire finished her remarks for the camera. She removed the clip-on microphone and walked over to the cop.

“Miss Phillips, this guy says he’s here to see you. Do you know him?”

“No. Who is he?”

He turned to Maxwell. “That’s it, pal. You’re outta here.”

“She’s saying that because she’s in love with me.”

The cop’s eyes narrowed. He looked Maxwell over, taking in the uniform, the three gold stripes on the sleeves, the rows of campaign ribbons. He turned to Claire. “This guy thinks you’re in love with him. That true?”

“Not any more. He’s an idiot.”

The cop nodded and turned to Maxwell. “Sounds like you blew it, buddy.”

“Yes, I know. I came to apologize.”

“Ah.” He turned to Claire. “Does it help if he apologizes, ma’am?”

“No. Why didn’t he answer my mail?”

He looked at Maxwell. “You got an answer for that?”

“I was away on an assignment.”

Claire said, “What kind of assignment?”

“I can’t tell you.”

The cop said, “Ma’am, this might be a misunderstanding. Maybe you oughta give the guy another chance.”

“Why? So he can tell me to have a happy life again?”

“He probably needs a little help. Some guys aren’t real good at expressing feelings, you know.”

“Probably why they call him ‘Brick.’”

The cop shook his head. He said to Maxwell, “Sounds like you messed up big time, buddy. You better think of something good to say.”

“How about if I tell her I love her?”

“Yeah, that might work.” He took the single rose from Maxwell and handed it to Claire. “He says he loves you, ma’am.”

She studied the rose. “How do I know he means it?”

He looked at Maxwell.

“She knows I love her. Always have, always will.”

The cop shrugged and said to Claire, “Okay, maybe the guy’s not real smooth, but I think he means it.”

“What’s he going to do about it?”

He looked at Maxwell. “Well?”

“I’m taking her to dinner.”

“Where?”

“Somewhere romantic. A place on the river.”

“Good call. Maybe one of the waterfront joints in Alexandria? Go for an outside table.”

They both looked at Claire. She wasn’t buying it. She stood there twirling the rose in her fingers, regarding the two men with her hazel eyes.

A crowd had gathered. She twirled the rose, saying nothing. Seconds ticked by. In the distance hummed the sounds of traffic. Time stood still.

She reached a decision. She hiked her skirt up over her knees, showing a length of tanned, freckled legs. She climbed onto the back seat of the motorcycle and put on the spare helmet.

The crowd burst into applause.

She clasped her arms around Maxwell’s waist. “Okay, sailor, this is your lucky day. You get one last chance.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

He buckled his helmet, then gunned the Harley’s engine and kicked it into first gear. As he pulled away, he looked back over his shoulder and waved to the cop.

Standing with his hands on his hips, Sergeant Grover watched them motor down the slope, over the sidewalk and onto the street. A nice couple, he thought. The guy was a klutz with women, but he was okay. He’d get it right sooner or later.

Then he noticed something else. An automobile creeping out into traffic behind the motorcycle. It was a plain white something, one of those bland-looking Japanese rental cars. A Virginia tag. Nothing out of the ordinary except—

Grover had been a D.C. cop for twenty-one years. During that time he had learned to listen to his instincts. Now his instincts were gnawing at the edge of his awareness, whispering some kind of subliminal signal. Something he wasn’t getting. What the hell was it?

The driver of the white car. For just an instant the cop had glimpsed the face of the driver, and the image was still stuck in his mind’s eye. It was not an ordinary face. The man’s eyes were burning like embers. The face of a man filled with rage.

Grover removed his cap and scratched his head, watching the white car disappear in traffic. What did it mean? He didn’t know. Nothing, probably. Nothing at all.

Maxwell toed the shift lever into third and accelerated down the two-lane state road. They had left the commuter-clogged metropolitan area and were entering the suburbs on the southeast shore of the Potomac. Along both sides of the road, stands of ash and maple were glowing in the first tinge of autumn. Long rays of evening sun slanted through the trees, casting shadows on the gray surface of the road.

He could feel her arms clasped around him, Her chin was resting on his shoulder.

“Where are we going?” she asked.

“Anywhere you’d like.”

“I like this, wherever we are. Can we just ride for a while?”

He nodded. Conversation was tough on the bike. The deep-throated rumble of the two-cylinder engine reverberated from the pavement, drowning out their words. There were a hundred things he wanted to tell her. Questions he wanted to ask. Later.

Traffic had thinned to a trickle. They were in a wooded section, between bedroom communities in the flatlands of northern Virginia. The Harley was purring like a well-fed lion. He passed a slow-moving panel truck, then crested a small hill and saw open road ahead.

A car was overtaking them. He saw it in the rear view mirror and slowed back to fifty, thinking it might be a police car. It was moving up fast, doing well over seventy. He moved over to the outer half of the right lane.

It wasn’t a police car, and it didn’t pass. It was a white car — a Toyota, he guessed. It slowed down and stayed behind him, two car lengths back. There was no oncoming traffic.

Maxwell slowed to forty and signaled for the car to pass. The car didn’t pass. He stayed behind, following them around a gradual turn.

Maxwell watched the car in the mirror. There was a man behind the wheel, no passengers. He signaled again for him to pass. The car still didn’t move.

Angling toward the road from the right was a railroad track on an elevated mound. Ahead Maxwell could see a tunnel where the high bed of the railroad track crossed the road. A brick wall covered the outer face of the tunnel.

When they were still two hundred yards from the tunnel, Maxwell saw the white car swerve out into the passing lane. This guy was a nutcase, or drunk, he thought. It wasn’t possible to see any oncoming traffic coming at them through the tunnel.

The car vanished from Maxwell’s mirror. Where did he—

There. In the left lane, close, pulling alongside them. Too damned close. Close enough for Maxwell to reach out and touch. The side mirror was only inches from his elbow.

Claire’s fingers were digging into his sides. “What’s he doing? Why is he so close?”

Maxwell didn’t know. He only knew that some crazy bastard was shoving his car into their lane. He looked through the open window on the Toyota’s passenger side, directly into the driver’s face. For a second that seemed to drag on for a minute, Maxwell and the driver locked gazes.

In an instant of comprehension, it came to him. It was the same face he had seen back at Groom Lake.

Lutz.

He knew now why Lutz had whirled away and walked away out of the hangar. And he knew exactly why Lutz was here now.

The car swerved toward them. Ahead the brick face of the tunnel entrance swelled in the windshield like an oncoming apparition.

The car thumped against the left handlebar of the motorcycle, sending it into a violent oscillation. Maxwell heard Claire scream, and he fought to maintain control.

He clamped on the brakes, trying to slow down and drop behind the car. Lutz slowed with him, still swerving, again banging into the bike. Maxwell jammed on full throttle to accelerate ahead.

It didn’t work. Lutz sped up, turning to cut him off. The Toyota swerved into the bike again, veering it toward the ditch.

The brick wall was on them. Maxwell turned the bike hard to the right, off the road and through the shallow ditch. The bike hit the slope of the embankment, missing the brick tunnel face by three feet.

Whump. The big Harley bounced off the incline of the embankment, the front wheel kicking high in the air.

The bike was airborne, sailing over the embankment. He heard a piercing wail from behind him. Claire’s fingers were gouging like daggers into his ribs. In his peripheral vision Maxwell saw the white car vanish into the tunnel.

The railroad track skimmed beneath them. The bike cleared the crest of the embankment, still airborne descending rear wheel first, plummeting toward the hard Virginia soil like a stone.

Maxwell’s last impression before impact was the long, loud wail from the girl on the seat behind him.

Darkness.

It happened so quickly. Lutz’s head was turned to the right, watching the bike disappear, when he entered the tunnel at over fifty miles per hour. Then the blackness inside the tunnel. It was if a switch had been thrown.

Fifty yards ahead he saw an expanding light at the end of the tunnel. It was like peering through a telescope.

The motorcycle? His last glimpse was as it veered off to the right. Then it hit something. The wall? The embankment?

He would stop beyond the tunnel and go back on foot. He’d find the wreckage of the motorcycle, and if they were somehow still alive he’d finish them.

Squinting in the darkness of the tunnel, he could trees and foliage ahead. Then he saw the diamond-shaped sign just beyond the exit. A left turn arrow.

And something else.

Lutz was momentarily blinded as the car flashed back into the sunlight.

Too late, he saw it. The orange construction barricade, blocking the right lane. He was going too fast, still over fifty. He slammed on the brakes and snatched the wheel hard to the left. The Toyota went into a tire-screeching skid.

The car smashed broadside through the wooden barrier. Skidding through the depression of the fleshly excavated asphalt, the Toyota spun around, sliding backwards, and left the road in a sickening skid.

When the Toyota hit the ditch, it flipped onto its side, then slid through the brush and low saplings until it impacted a solid stand of maple trees.

A cloud of dust and leaves settled over the wreck. No sound came from the Toyota except the tinkle of glass and settling debris and the hiss of steam.

A hell of a ride.

Wobbling to his feet, Maxwell removed his helmet and did a damage assessment. The helmet had an ugly scrape where it had contacted something solid. His uniform coat was torn, one sleeve hanging like a pennant. The knee was gone from one trouser leg.

For some reason he couldn’t explain, he seemed to be alive. Leaping a railroad embankment at fifty miles an hour on a motorcycle was a feat he had never expected to survive. He should have broken every bone in his body.

He stood there, his thinking still muddled, trying to reconstruct what happened. They had landed in a hedge, which had probably—

Claire. Oh, hell, where is Claire?

He had a vague memory of flying over the embankment, plunging into the hedge, being vaulted over the handlebars. He’d landed on his side, rolling in a ball down the slope into a waist-high thicket of vines and saplings.

Where is Claire?

He clambered back up the slope. The Harley was protruding from the hedge like an abstract sculpture. The front wheel was skewed back at a grotesque angle, and the handlebars were bent like a pretzel.

No sign of Claire. She wasn’t in the hedge. Nor was she on the embankment where he had landed after departing the bike.

Then he saw her. She was in a thicket of briars and vines, thirty yards away. The foliage was so thick he hadn’t seen her. She appeared to be okay except—

She wasn’t moving. She was sitting in the weeds, motionless, as if she were paralyzed. Or badly hurt. Or worse.

Maxwell stumbled down through the weeds to her. “Claire! Are you—”

“Sssshhh.” She held her finger to her lips. She wasn’t paralyzed. She was kneeling, pointing at an object fifty yards away. It was the hulk of what used to be a white Toyota, crunched up against a stand of trees. A wisp of steam was coming from the crumpled hood.

“Are you okay?” he whispered.

“I think so. Where you’d learn to ride like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like Evel Knieval.”

“I didn’t. That’s why we crashed.”

She made a face, then turned back to the wrecked Toyota. “That’s the car that almost killed us. I think he hit something coming out of the tunnel.”

Maxwell looked at the car. There was no sign of life. If Lutz was still in it, he was unconscious. Or dead, which was even better.

He started toward the car.

Claire grabbed his sleeve. “Where are you going?”

“To have a chat with the driver. He needs some remedial training.”

“Don’t, Sam. Did you see his face? He’s a killer.”

Worse than that, thought Maxwell. If he was right about Lutz, he was the one who gave the Black Star to the Chinese.

“He’s probably unconscious. Don’t worry, I’ll be careful.” He gave her a quick kiss and a smile that conveyed more conviction than he really felt.

Watching for movement, he crossed the low thicket between them and the smashed Toyota. The car lay on its side, driver’s side up. The roof was crunched up against the trunk of a large tree. As he approached, he saw no sign of life.

Maxwell knelt and peered through the broken back window. He couldn’t see the driver. Maybe he was slumped on the floor.

He walked around to the front. Steam was hissing from beneath the wrinkled hood. The windshield was shattered, the spider web of cracks making it difficult to see inside. He had to stand on the bumper, raising himself up to peer through the broken glass.

He was still standing on the bumper when Claire’s voice reached him from across the thicket. “Sam! Behind you!”

Maxwell whirled, and there was Lutz. His face was twisted into a snarling mask. Behind the thick-lensed spectacles, the bulging orbs looked like the eyes of an undersea creature.

Lutz was on him before he could react. From three feet away he lunged, grabbing Maxwell around the torso. They hit the ground in a heap, Lutz on top, ramming the breath from Maxwell.

Lutz had a hand clamped on his throat. His other hand was clawing at Maxwell’s face, gouging at his eyes. Lutz glowered down into Maxwell’s face. “Hello, glory hound,” he said. “Remember me?”

Maxwell was shocked at the man’s agility. Lutz was big, at least two inches taller and a good sixty pounds heavier, but he had moved with surprising speed.

Lutz’s fingers were probing for his eyes, clawing his face. The hand on his throat felt like a vise, squeezing the life from him. Maxwell’s vision was fading into a dark field of tiny twinkling lights. He felt the life draining from him.

He summoned all his remaining strength and rammed a knee hard into Lutz’s crotch. He felt the grip loosen on his throat. He swung a wild, wide haymaker that caught Lutz in the side of head and rolled him onto the ground.

Maxwell scuttled away from him, gasping for air. The two men rose, facing each other. Lutz’s nostrils were flared, his features contorted into a feral snarl.

Maxwell remembered seeing that face. It was in the martial arts course in the Navy’s preflight school at Pensacola. He’d been matched against an opponent heavier and stronger than he. The man came at him like a bear, all mass and fury and brute strength.

It was Lutz, and he hadn’t changed his style.

Lutz lunged at him, thick arms slicing the air, groping for Maxwell’s throat. A low guttural noise swelled from inside him.

Maxwell took a step back, ducked the flailing arms, and drove a hard left jab into Lutz’s face. Lutz recoiled from the blow. He blinked and shook his head, spraying blood from his nose.

Then he charged again.

Maxwell hit him again with the left jab, then followed with a hard right cross that thudded into his cheek bone. Lutz reeled backwards, somehow staying on his feet. He spat blood from his mouth and glowered at Maxwell.

He charged again.

Maxwell backed up, moving on the balls of his feet, looking for an opening. As Lutz’s big arms came for him, Maxwell saw it. He stepped in with a left jab, all his weight behind it, straight into Lutz’s face. It sounded like an ax thudding into a log.

Lutz wobbled on his feet, glasses askew, blinded by pain and fury. Maxwell moved in, driving a hard right into the broad belly. Lutz whooshed air like a whale and his knees buckled. He dropped in a heap, his head thumping up against the wrecked Toyota.

Maxwell rubbed the knuckles of his left hand. It felt like he’d broken a bone. His chest ached, and he was sure he had some broken ribs from Lutz’s first charge.

Lutz was spurting blood from his nose, breathing with a noise that sounded like a sputtering engine. His thick round spectacles were twisted, slanting across his forehead.

Lutz replaced his glasses and spat a wad of blood on the ground. For a long moment the two men held eye contact. Maxwell watched him, sure that Lutz was defeated, no longer a threat. But Lutz was a crazed animal. He’d try it again, and when he did—

There was something about Lutz’s expression. He didn’t look defeated. He was leaning back against the car, his chest heaving. His face was twisted in a smirk.

From the pocket of his jacket he produced a pistol.

Damn! Maxwell cursed himself for being so careless. He should have expected it. Of course Lutz would have a gun. That was his style — to inflict maximum pain and suffering, go for the eyes and throat. If that didn’t work, then he’d go for the gun.

It was a semi-automatic, a Beretta, Maxwell guessed, probably 9 mm. Lutz’s eyes stayed fixed on him as he raised the pistol.

Only three feet away. No place to hide, no way to escape.

“You… fucking… prima donna.” Lutz’s breath came in hoarse rasps. “I’ve been waiting fifteen years…to do this.”

Maxwell flinched at the sharp crack of the pistol shot. In the same instant he felt the hot flash of pain through his upper right arm. He clutched his left hand over the wound, feeling a warm trickle of blood through a half-inch gash in his arm.

Lutz was smiling through his battered lips. “Just like old times… isn’t it, glory hound?”

Maxwell saw the pistol raise again, aiming at his abdomen. He could make a run for it, but he dismissed the idea. It would just get him a bullet in the back instead of the front. He hoped Claire was already running, getting the hell away.

Maxwell tensed himself. He’d rush him. Maybe cause him to shoot wild. It was useless, but—

Another shot cracked the still air. He flinched, waiting for the inevitable pain. It didn’t come. Dimly he was aware that the gunshot had a different sound, a more deep-throated bark. From a different direction.

He stood there, frozen, staring at Lutz. Something had changed. Lutz was still leaning against the car, but the pistol was lowered to his side.

His glasses. The left lens of Lutz’s round spectacles had a starburst pattern with a neat hole in the center. Behind the shattered lens was a purplish cavity where Lutz’s eyeball had been.

A crashing noise came from the brush behind Maxwell. He whirled to see a burly man in a police uniform charging through the thicket. He held a heavy revolver in his outstretched hands, keeping it pointed at Lutz.

It was the cop who had tried to chase him away from Claire’s interview back at the mall. He stood over Lutz for a moment, keeping the pistol trained on him.

“I heard the shot and I—” He noticed Maxwell clutching his arm. “Uh, oh. How bad is it?”

“Could have been worse,” said Maxwell. “I don’t suppose you could have arrived a minute sooner?”

“No. Are you criticizing my marksmanship?”

“No, sir. Excellent shooting.”

“Thank you.” The cop holstered his pistol. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’ll live.” He looked at Lutz. His remaining eye was staring blindly into the evening sky. “Which is more than I can say for him.”

“Who is he?”

“His name is Lutz.” Maxwell hesitated, no sure how much to say, not sure if he knew the truth himself. “He’s an engineer on a classified defense project.”

“So why was he trying to whack you?”

“He was, ah, selling military secrets. I got in his way.”

The cop’s eyes narrowed. “Uh, huh. So who are you? Some kind of spy catcher?”

Before Maxwell could come up with an answer, they heard a commotion in the thicket behind them. They turned to see Claire wading through the high weeds, making her way down to them. Her elbow was bleeding, and she had grass stains on her skirt.

She went straight to Maxwell and hugged him so tightly it made his injured ribs ache. Then she saw his wounded arm.

“Oh, Sam, are you —”

“It’s okay. Nothing serious.”

“I was so frightened, Sam. I thought you were…” She broke down sobbing, shaking uncontrollably. For nearly a minute no one spoke while Maxwell held her, stroking her hair, letting her cry.

Claire sniffed, wiped her eyes, then composed herself. She took a cautious look at Lutz’s body, shuddered and immediately looked away. “Is he. .. somebody you know?”

He nodded, telling her with his eyes to leave it alone. She nodded back, but he knew Claire. She was a reporter. The questions would come later. Lots of them.

She turned to the cop and said, “I never heard your name, officer.”

“It’s Grover, ma’am. Sergeant Earl Grover.”

“How did you happen to be here?”

“That guy.” The cop nodded toward Lutz’s corpse. “I’ve seen some mean-looking dudes in my time, but he took the prize. When I saw him back at the mall, I could tell by his face that he meant to do you folks some harm. So I decided to follow him in the patrol car.”

“You saved our lives.” Claire reached out and took his hand. “How can we ever repay you?”

The cop looked embarrassed. He removed his cap and wiped his brow with his sleeve. He scuffed his shoe on the ground, then replanted the cap on his mat of wiry gray hair. “Well, Miss Phillips, uh, there is one small favor…”

“Yes?” She looked at him expectantly.

“Me and my wife, we both just love your TV show. Would it be possible, do you think, to get your autograph?” He produced a pad of paper and a ballpoint. “She’d just be tickled to death if…”

“It would be an honor, Sergeant.”

Maxwell stood to the side while she wrote in the cop’s notebook. Claire was a mess, he observed. Her hair was disheveled, hanging in sweaty strands over her forehead. Grass stains covered the backside of her skirt. A streak of dirt ran down the length of her fine, tapered nose.

He almost laughed, but the ache in his ribs cut it short. This was not the cool and composed Claire Phillips seen by millions on nightly television. She looked as if she’d been flung through a hedge at fifty miles an hour, rolled like a bowling pin down a hillside, then dumped in a briar patch.

Which, as he thought about it, was pretty much what happened.

She caught him watching her and flashed a smile. Despite the stinging in his arm and the ache in his ribs, he felt a warm glow settle over him.

So much had happened these past weeks, some of it good, much of it bad. Seeing Claire Phillips smile at him, dirty face and all, made it all okay. He had the sure sense that life was about to get better. Much better.