Circle of Scorpions

Nine

The apartment was in a building that was exactly like its neighbors in the hills above Montmartre. It contained a living room, two small bedrooms, a tiny kitchen, bathroom, and an entrance hall. The furniture was modern and cheap but comfortable.

It was perfect in every way, including privacy and security. Carlotta Polti had checked it out herself in every detail.

It would provide the perfect safe house after the break for herself, Carter, and Pietro Amani, until the old man dictated the next move.

The buzzer rang from five flights below, and Carlotta pressed the button. "Yes?"

"My name is Justin."

"Come up."

She buzzed the voice in and lifted her skirt. Attached to her right inner thigh with a soft chamois harness was a six-inch tube that looked like no more than a chrome pipe with a small plunger on one end. Actually, it was a single-shot pistol that carried a .44 dumdum slug.

From five feet or less, it could tear a man's side out.

Carlotta checked the load, dropped her skirt, and moved to answer the rap on the door.

She gazed through the peephole and then muttered in a low voice, "Move aside, please."

"I am alone."

"I said, move aside."

He did. When she was satisfied that he was indeed alone, she opened the door and moved back into the living room.

Jason Henry was a king-size man with a florid face that sported a habitual grin and a gleam in the eye that could only be described as mischievous.

Well, well," he said, moving to within a foot of Carlotta and letting his eyes enjoy what they saw.

"You look surprised. Mr. Henry."

"I am. The scum that usually hires me this way are generally short, fat, beady-eyed, and can barely speak French or English through their slobbery lips."

"Sorry to disappoint you."

"Believe me, I am not disappointed. Got anything around here to drink"

"Wine?" Carlotta asked, already knowing the answer. "Wine? Hell. lady, mat's for washing down a steak or saying beads!"

"There's a bottle of American whiskey, there, and glasses. Pour me one. too,"

He smiled and roiled toward the table with something akin to a sailor's gait. As he poured the whiskey, Carlotta lit a cigarette and went over what she saw, and what she knew about Jason Henry.

His clothes were far from Parisian chic: khaki pants and shirt with the sleeves rolled to the midpoint of bulging biceps. His shoes were canvas half boots, and he wore no socks. He was a good six and a half feet tall and would never see two hundred and fifty pounds again no matter what diet he used.

Under his roaring manner Carlotta sensed the guile and wit of a true intelligence, and a sensitivity beyond the personality he showed the world. He could have been a New York cop, a New Jersey longshoreman, a Boston politician, or an IRA radical in Cork — anything but an American expatriate on the European continent.

He had served twelve years with the U.S. Army and attained the rank of major in Vietnam. When that war ended, Henry had gone to work for the CIA.

Because of bureaucracy — and the agency not using his many talents — Jason Henry had gotten bored. He resigned. but because of the many contacts he had made, he was able to get work as a mercenary.

Between those jobs, he filled in his time — and his bank account — with a flying service. He was known to have some scruples, but most of them could be stretched with the right amount of money.

Before he had been chosen and contacted by Carlotta, he had been thoroughly checked out on his latest escapades by the Americans and her own SID. Much of what he had been up to had been shady or downright illegal, but mat only made him more ideal for the assignment.

Henry handed her a glass and raised his own in a salute. "To the devil and beautiful women!"

Carlotta smiled and raised her glass. "To them being one and the same, Mr. Henry."

"A lady after my own heart!" He drank and smacked his lips. "If we're going to do some hell-raising and head-busting together, why don't you start calling me Jason?

"Fair enough. My name is Carlotta."

"Carlotta what?"

"Carlotta none-of-your-business. Now why don't we sit down and talk?"

His grin, if possible, widened, and the twinkle in his eyes got brighter. "Carlotta, I think I'm gonna like you."

He took a chair, she the opposite sofa, with a coffee table between them. She spread papers and maps out on the table, and looked up. "There will be certain preparations to make before the actual mission starts."

"And the mission?"

"It's in two parts. The first will be to help two men escape from Castel Montferrato, in Italy."

Henry whistled. "Sounds like fun."

"Now, suppose we get down to it."

She spoke rapidly in quick, staccato sentences, but it still took her over an hour to explain the entire operation with all its ramifications.

When she was finished, Henry got up and poured himself another glass of whiskey. When he returned to his chair, he brought the bottle with him.

"Well?"

"Lady, uh, Carlotta… you know what you're asking for?"

"I do. I've just spelled most of it out."

"You want three untraceable cars to use for carry, lead, and chase. You want three other low-life gunnies that can be trusted, you want to refit a helicopter, and you want the use of my own plane to fly to hell-knows-where."

"That's exactly what I want."

"Like I say, you want a bundle!"

Carlotta placed a pad before him, lifted a pen, and wrote a figure. "I'm paying a bundle, plus expenses."

Henry looked at the figure and roared with a laugh that practically rocked the room's walls. "Carlotta, I'm your man."

She flipped a picture across the table. "Can you fly this?"

"An H-34? Hell, yes. I flew those banana boats before I knew how to fly props."

She turned a map around. "This machine is currently here, in a bam about thirty kilometers from the Italian frontier. It needs to be repainted and resignatured. There is also a hoisting device that has been removed but must be reinstalled with a pickup hook."

He nodded. "Probably the same kind we used in Nam. I know it. When does all this have to be ready?"

"In forty-eight hours."

"Jesus."

"Can it be done?"

Jason Henry glanced again at the pad containing the figures and grinned. "It can be done."

Émile Dobruck stepped from the car and crossed the narrow walk to the Club Paris. Without a verbal order, the driver stayed in the car while the two other passengers, Dobruck's new bodyguards, entered the club with him.

At the door, he was greeted with much bowing and scraping, and was escorted to the best table in the house. This was always the case when he was in Brussels and decided on a night out at the Club Paris.

Émile Dobruck owned the club and most of the real estate surrounding it.

His manager, Montchard, saw his boss enter and, knowing Dobruck's taste, immediately signaled the new girl that he had just hired two days before to wait on him.

"Sophie, that is Monsieur Dobruck."

"Yes."

"See that he gets anything he wants… anything."

"Yes."

Dobruck caught sight of her before she was halfway across the room headed for his table, and smiled.

Her generous hips moved like a metronome. Above the waist she wore nothing but a thin — a very thin — silk blouse. It was unbuttoned very low and knotted beneath her ample breasts. She wore no bra, so there was a great deal of creamy flesh exposed almost to the nipples. The nipples themselves, while not exposed, were still visible, twin pink points of firmness pressed against the tight thinness of the blouse.

Below the waist, she wore a pair of hip pants, cut very low in front and back. They were of black elastic mesh.

"I am here to serve you. Monsieur Dobruck."

Her voice was like silk, and the animal heal from her near naked body seemed to flow outward and scorch him.

"You're new."

"I started just yesterday."

"You're not from Brussels."

"No, I am Spanish." she lied.

"And your name?"

"Sophie."

He nodded. "The bartender knows what I drink."

Dobruck watched her move away. She was young and she was beautiful, and because he was who he was, she would be available.

When she returned with his drink, she brushed the mesh covering her hip against his shoulder, again searing his flesh through his jacket.

He fumbled with his wallet.

"There is no charge. Monsieur Dobruck."

"I know," he replied, folding a large note and slipping it into her cleavage. Perhaps later you will join me for the show."

"I don't know…"

"I'll arrange it."

She returned just as the house lights dimmed. In the interim, she had removed the revealing costume and replaced it with a tight sweater and skirt. The street clothes somehow made her look even sexier, and much younger.

Montchard knew exactly what ferrule Dobruck liked.

By the end of the show, the girl, Sophie, had made him putty in her hands.

"My house is only ten minutes away," he croaked hoarsely.

"My hotel is only two minutes… a short walk."

"But we can be more comfortable…"

"No, I'll feel safer in my own room," she replied.

Dobruck was about to get angry. He was about to let her know who he was and what power he had, when he felt her hands on his thighs beneath the table.

Five minutes later they were walking arm in arm from the club.

"This way." she said, turning right. "Who are they?"

Dobruck shrugged. "They are my associates."

"Do they follow you everywhere?"

"Almost everywhere."

"Not into the bedroom, I trust," she said coyly.

"No, my little angel, not into the bedroom."

But almost. One of the bodyguards stayed in the hotel lobby. The other followed them up to her floor and found a chair in the hall.

"Will he just sit there?" Sophie asked, opening the door.

"Unless I need him," Dobruck replied with a leer.

"Let's hope you don't," she laughed, shrugging her jacket off and exiting to the bath. On her way by, she snapped on a radio. "There is brandy on the dresser."

Dobruck poured two glasses of the amber liquid into a glass with quivering fingers.

My night, he thought, already imagining the next hour with this young beauty. This will be my night!

And then she was back, dressed in a filmy gown that left nothing to the imagination. She took one of the glasses and moved into his arms.

"You are very beautiful, my dear… a young, sensual animal."

"I have Latin blood," she crooned into his ear.

She was light in his arms, and her hair was soft against his cheek. He held her close as he maneuvered her to the bed, and she didn't resist.

She smells of lemons, he thought as the back of her knees hit the bed.

Beneath the filmy sheerness of her gown, he could feel her breasts moving against his chest. Her hips met his, and he shivered at the liquid movement of her body.

"I want you," he growled.

"Are you very rich, Monsieur Dobruck?"

"Very. Rich enough to give you anything you want."

She bent the upper half of her body back in the circle of his arms. As she drained the glass and dropped it to the carpet, she gyrated her pelvis and hips against him.

"Then undress me… here," she said, pointing to the sash at her waist.

He drained his own glass, dropped it, and reached with the same hand for the sash. He tugged it, and gasped.

Suddenly the filmy gown was in a heap at her feet, and what was beneath it was a study in olive and pink tones.

A black, lacy bra only just contained the determined thrust of her high-riding breasts, and a black gaiter belt inadequately straddled the rounded curve of her hips.

She wore no panties, and long, tapering legs supported the breathtaking torso above. Completing the erotic fantasy, and driving everything else from Dobruck's mind, were the sheer black hose attached to the garter belt.

"You are a vision."

"Now," she said, dropping to her back on the bed and spreading her thighs, "undress yourself… and take me."

His fingers flew. His eyes were misty, devouring only her body, so that he didn't see the wide smile that stretched her lips when he dropped the Walther and holster from his shoulder out of reach on the floor.

When he too was naked, he leaned one knee on the bed and began crawling upward over the luxurious softness of her willing body. So filled were his senses with the sight, the smell, and the touch of her, that he failed to hear the bathroom door open behind him.

He was about to enter her, when he saw her eyes open wide. They were suddenly glazed over, and the smile on her lips was like a sneer of defiance.

"Do not be afraid, my dear."

"I'm not," she murmured. "Believe me, I am not."

Émile Dobruck felt only a tiny pain at the base of his neck before Pocky drove the spike inward, severing his spine.

There was no sound, and hardly a drop of blood. Using only the embedded spike for leverage, Pocky lifted the lifeless body off Sophia and let it slither to the floor.

"Hurry!" he said, cleaning the spike on the bedspread. "Dress! We will use the roof. The car is waiting in an alley a block from here!"

Sophia didn't answer. When he looked up, her eyes still held that glazed quality and her body was quivering.

"Sophia, get dressed!"

"No, not yet."

"What?"

She turned to him. "Pocky, take your clothes off."

She lay back on the bed, assuming the pose that she had just assumed in front of Dobruck.

And then he understood.

"Sophia, are you mad…?"

"Yes. Undress, Pocky… hurry. We have time… hurry!"

It was insane, and yet it somehow fit. Her eyes drew him like a magnet as he fumbled with his clothes.

And then it was her body drawing him, engulfing him, swallowing him…

Carter moved his hand through the bars, twisted the key around, and seconds later silently slid the cell door open.

Everything was going like clockwork.

Pietro Amani had swallowed it all. Carter knew the whole story, right down to the very time the meeting would be convened.

The only thing Amani had held back was the place. But Carter knew that if Amani expected to be delivered there, he would soon know that as well.

Carlotta and her SID people had come through like champions. The gear that he needed had been delivered early that morning, secreted under the flooring of a van delivering new prisoners. Carter had already transferred it to an abandoned tool shed in the most unused section of the courtyard.

It was three a.m. sharp when he slid on his belly the few remaining feet to Amani's cell and tapped lightly on the bars.

Instantly the old man's face and gray mane appeared at the bars. "You are ready?"

"Yes. Do your people know what to do?"

"They will perform to the letter," the man replied in a whisper.

Carter was sure they would. If they didn't, and that was the cause of failure, the old terrorist would have them visited by an iceman.

"You've put the dummy in the bed?" Carter asked.

"Yes. I am ready."

"Then let's go!"

Using his own key, Amani opened the cell, slipped out, and relocked it behind him.

Together, the two men walked down the tier.

Getting off the cellblock and into the yard would be the trickiest part of the plan. It would have been easier if someone in the prison, either a guard or one of the administrative staff, could have been let in on the ruse. But both Carter and the SID people had vetoed such a gamble.

Graft, bribery, and corruption were too rife. It would have been impossible to be sure that whoever they let in on the plan wouldn't go right to Amani himself and offer to sell the information that he was being broken out by an agent of the United States government.

They reached the end of the cellblock without rousing anyone, and Carter halted. Mentally he thanked the energy shortage. The entire block between the cells was lit by only two low-watt yellow bulbs.

If one of the prisoners had seen them pass, he wouldn't have been able to distinguish between them and guards making rounds.

Where they now stood, there was complete darkness.

"There's a narrow corridor this way, between the wall and the last cell. Grab my belt and stay close!"

Carter moved into the corridor in a half crouch, the Italian on his heels. He made his way about twenty feet by feel alone and halted when his groping hand touched wood.

"Here."

"What is it?" Amani whispered.

"A book of matches. Light one and shield it with your body."

The scrape of the match was like a shot going off in the deathly stillness. The flickering light revealed a four-foot-high door with an ancient padlock.

"What is this?"

Carter spoke as he went to work on the lock. "A few years ago, the powers that be in the prison system decided this whole damned place was a firetrap."

"Which it is," the Italian said with a chuckle.

"Agreed," Carter said, snapping the lock open. "They had to install a way for the prisoners to get down from the third tier lo the first, in case the stairs were blocked."

The light flickered and went out. By the time Amani lit another match, Carter had the door open.

"A fireman's pole!" Amani gasped.

"Yeah," Carter said. "It satisfied the safety people, but of coarse no one bothered to tell the prisoners it was here."

"But when we get down to the first tier, we will still be in the cellblocks."

"No, we won't, because we're not going down… we're going up. Take your shoes and socks off and tie them around your neck."

"Why?"

"Because the pole is slick — easy to shoe down, hard to climb up. You can get more leverage with bare skin."

They both quickly removed their shoes and socks and tied them around their necks. Then Carter lit the whole book of matches and leaned into the hole, holding the light over his head.

"Think you can make it?" It was about forty feet to the top and the trapdoor leading onto the roof.

Amani nodded. "I'll make it. There is still a lot of muscle in this fat."

"Good enough. If you feel yourself start to slip, grab my leg."

Carter dried his hands, blew out the matches, and gripped the pole. Monkey like, he got the soles of his feet on it and started up.

He could hear Amani behind him already puffing, and hoped the man could last until he, Carter, could get me trap open and lean back to help him.

"You all right?"

"Yes," came the gasping reply. "How much… much…"

"Farther?"

"Yes."

"I'm there."

The trap creaked like hell when it was opened, but Carter managed to lower it softly to the roof. He jackknifed out of the hole and instantly whirled to dip one arm back in.

"Grab my hand!"

Amani managed to wrap one hand, and then both of them, around Carter's wrist, even as he started slipping back down the pole.

To the old man's surprise, he felt himself being hoisted upward as if his weight were no more than a mere boy's.

Once on the roof, with breath back in his lungs, he turned to face Carter.

"You are very, very strong, Kashmir.

"I know," Carter said, grinning. "Don't forget it in the days ahead. Come on, this way!"

As they ran across the roof, Carter unwound a nylon line from beneath his shirt. He secured it to a ventilator pipe, looked over the side, and dropped it with a hissing sound toward the ground.

"We are over the old part of the yard, where they dump the trash and where the tool sheds for the gardens are located.

"I know it," Amani replied and smiled. "Very wise. The lights here have been burned out for months.

"Were burned out. The bastards replaced them the day before yesterday. I spent the whole afternoon today with a slingshot and rocks, breaking them out again."

"How far down is it?"

"About a hundred feet. Can you make it?"

"Going down, Kashmir, even that distance, will be easier than what I just did!"

"Good. Here, lake one pair of these gloves. The rope is nylon, and even though it's knotted every foot or so, it will burn the hell out of your hands if you slip. And put your shoes back on."

When they were both ready. Carter slipped over the side and began his descent into the darkness.