London Bridges

Chapter 89

The bomb, or bombs, not nuclear, but powerful enough to cause massive damage, went off in the first arrondissement, near the Louvre. The entire area, a maze of lanes and dead-end streets, was nearly flattened. Close to a thousand people died immediately, or at least within a few seconds. The terrible multiple explosions were heard, and felt, all over Paris.

The Louvre suffered only minor damage from the blasts, but the three-block area covering rue de Marengo, rue de l'Oratoire and rue Bailleul was almost completely destroyed. As was a nearby bridge-a small one-crossing the Seine.

A bridge. Another bridge. In Paris this time.

Not a word of explanation was heard from the Wolf. He didn't take credit for the wanton and despicable act, nor did he deny it.

He didn't need to explain his actions, did he? He thought he was God.

There are other supremely arrogant people who labor inside our government in Washington, and also some who work in the national media, who believe that they can accurately predict what will happen in the future because they know, or think they know, what happened in the past. I suspect it's the same in Paris, London, Tel Aviv, and everywhere else in the world: all these basically intelligent, maybe even well-intentioned people who proclaim, "That couldn't happen," or "Here's how it would happen in the real world." As if they really know. But they don't know. Nobody knows.

All bets are off nowadays. Anything can happen, and sooner or later, it probably will. We don't seem to be getting any smarter as a species, just crazier and crazier. Or at the very least, a whole lot more dangerous. Unbelievably, unbearably more dangerous.

Or maybe that was just my mood as I flew back from Paris. A terrible, terrible tragedy had occurred there after all. The Wolf had won, if what he did could be called winning, and it hadn't even been a close contest.

A power-mad Russian gangster had adopted the tactics of terrorism, or so it seemed. He was better than we were-more organized, more cunning, and far more brutal when he needed results. I couldn't even remember the last time we'd had a victory in our battle with the Wolf and his forces. He was smarter. I just prayed that it was over now. Could it be? Or was it another calm before another storm? I couldn't bear to think about that possibility.

I arrived home a little before three on a Thursday afternoon. The kids were back; Nana had never left Fifth Street. When I got there I insisted on cooking dinner, wouldn't take no for an answer. It was what I needed: cook a good meal, talk to Nana and the kids about anything we wanted to talk about, get lots of hugs. Not have a single thought about what had happened in Paris, or the Wolf, or any kind of police work.

So I made my interpretation of a French-style dinner and I even spoke French with Damon and Jannie while the meal was being prepared. Jannie set the dining table with Nana's silver, cloth napkins, a lace tablecloth that we used only for special occasions. The meal? Langoustines rôties brunoises de papaye poivrons et oignons doux -prawns with papaya, peppers, and onions. For a main course, chicken stew in a sweet red wine sauce. We drank small glasses of wine with the meal, a delightful Minervois, and ate with enthusiasm.

But for dessert-brownies and ice cream. I was back in America, after all.

I was home, thank God.

Chapter 90

Home again, home again.

The next day I didn't go to work and the kids stayed out of school. It seemed to satisfy everybody's needs, even Nana Mama's, who encouraged us all to play hooky. I called Jamilla a couple of times, and talking to her helped, as it always did, but something seemed off between us.

For our day of hooky-playing I took the kids on a day trip to St. Michaels, Maryland, which is situated on Chesapeake Bay. The village turned out to be a lively snapshot of quaint, coastal charm: a thriving marina, a couple of small inns with rockers set out on the porches, even a lighthouse. And the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, where we got to watch real shipwrights working on a skipjack restoration. It felt as though we were back in the nineteenth century, which didn't seem like such a bad idea.

After lunch at the Crab Claw Restaurant we embarked on an actual skipjack charter. Nana Mama had taken her school classes there many times over the years, but she stayed home this trip, protesting that she had too much work to do around the house. I only hoped she was really feeling okay. I still remembered the way she used to teach her students on the field trips, so I took over as the guest lecturer.

"Jannie and Damon, this is the last fleet of working sailing vessels in North America. Can you imagine? These ships have no winches, just manpower and blocks and tackles. The fishermen are called watermen," I told them, just as Nana had told her classes years before.

Then off we went on the Mary Merchant for a two-and-a-half-hour cruise into the past.

The captain and his mate showed us how to hoist a sail with a block and tackle, and soon we had caught a breeze with a loud whoosh and the rhythmic smack of waves against the hull. What an afternoon it was. Gazing up at a sixty-foot mast made from a single log shipped all the way from Oregon. The smells of salt air, linseed oil, residual oystershells. The closeness of my two eldest children, the look of trust and love in their eyes. Most of the time, anyway.

We passed stands of pine woods, open fields where tenant farmers raised corn and soybean, and great white-columned estates that had once been plantations. I almost felt as if I were back in another century and it was a good break, much needed R amp; R. Only a couple of times did I drift into thoughts of police work, but I quickly pulled myself back.

I half listened as the captain explained that "only boats under sail" can dredge for oysters-except twice a week, when engine-powered yawls were allowed on the bay. I suspected that it was a clever conservation ploy to make the watermen work hard for their oysters; otherwise, the supply might run out.

What a fine day-as the boat heeled to starboard, the boom swung out, the mainsail and jib filled the air with a loud smack, and Jannie, Damon, and I squinted into the setting sun. And we understood, for a little while anyway, that this had something to do with the way life was supposed to be lived, and maybe even why such moments needed to be cherished and remembered.

"Best day of my life," Jannie told me. "I'm not even exaggerating too much."

"Same here," I said. "And I'm not exaggerating at all."

Chapter 91

When we got home early that evening I saw a scuffed-up white van parked in front of the house. I recognized the bright green logo on the door: HOMECARE HEALTH PROJECT. What was this? Why was Dr. Coles there?

Suddenly I was nervous that something had happened to Nana while I was out with the kids. The fragile state of her health had been on my mind more and more lately; the reality that she was in her mid-eighties now, though she wouldn't tell exactly how old she was, or rather, she lied about it. I hurried out of the car and up the front steps ahead of the kids by a couple of strides.

"I'm in here with Kayla," Nana called as I opened the front door and Damon and Jannie slid by me on either side. "We're just kicking back, Alex. No need for alarm. Take your time."

"So who's alarmed?" I asked as I slowed and walked into the living room, saw the two of them "kicking back" on the sofa.

"You were, Mr. Worrywart. You saw the Health truck outside, and what did you think? Sickness," said Nana.

She and Kayla both laughed merrily, and I had to smile, too-at myself. I made a very weak protest. "Never happened."

"Then why did you rush up the front steps like your trousers were on fire? Oh, forget it, Alex," Nana said, and laughed some more.

Then she waved her hand as if to chase away any unwanted negativity in the room. "Come. Sit down with us for a minute or two. Can you spare it? Tell me everything. How was St. Michaels? Has it changed very much?"

"Oh, I suspect that St. Michaels is pretty much the same as it was a hundred years ago."

"Which is a good thing," Nana said. "Thank God for small favors."

I went over and gave Kayla a kiss on the cheek. She had helped Nana when she was sick a while back, and now she stopped in regularly. Actually, I'd known Kayla since we were both growing up in the neighborhood. She was one of us who got out, received an education, and then came back, to give back. The Homecare Health Project brought doctors to the homes of the sick in Southeast. Kayla had started it, and she kept it going with incredibly hard work, including fund-raising, which she mostly did herself.

"You look good," I told her. The words just came out.

"Yes, I lost some weight, Alex," she said, and cocked an eyebrow at me. "It's all this running around that I do. I try my best to keep the weight on, but it just comes off, damn it."

I had noticed. Kayla is close to six feet, but I had never seen her looking so trim and fit, not even when she was a kid. She's always had a sweet, pretty face and a disposition to match.

"It also sets a better example for folks," she said. "Too many people in the neighborhood are overweight. Too many are obese, even a lot of the kids. They think it's in their genes."

Then Kayla laughed. "Plus, I must admit, it has helped my social life, my outlook on things, whatever. Whatever."

"Well, you always look good to me," I said, putting my foot in it again.

Kayla rolled her eyes at Nana. "He lies so easily. He's really good at it." They both laughed again.

"Anyway, thank you for the compliment, Alex," said Kayla. "I'll take it for what it's worth. I don't even consider it too condescending. Oh, you know what I mean."

I decided I'd better change the topic. "So Nana is fine, and going to live to a hundred?"

"I would expect so," Kayla said.

But Nana frowned. "Why do you want to get rid of me so soon?" she asked. "What did I do to deserve that?"

I laughed. "Maybe it's because you're a constant pain in my butt. You know that, don't you?"

"Of course I know it," Nana said. "That's my job in life. My reason for being is to torment you. Don't you know that yet?"

And as she said those words, I finally felt that I was home again, really home, back from the wars. I took Kayla and Nana out to the sunporch and played "An American in Paris" for them. That's what I had been not too long ago, but no more.

About eleven, I walked Kayla outside to her Health van. We stopped and talked for a moment on the front porch.

"Thanks for coming by to see her," I said.

"You don't have to thank me," Kayla said. "I do it because I want to. It just so happens that I love your grandmother. I love her tremendously. She's one of my guiding lights, my mentor. Has been for years."

Then Kayla leaned in very quickly, and she kissed me. She held the kiss for a few seconds. When she pulled away she was laughing. "I've wanted to do that for the longest time."

"And?" I asked, more than slightly surprised at what had just happened.

"Now I've done it, Alex. Interesting."

"Interesting?"

"I have to go. I have to run."

Laughing to herself, Kayla ran out to her van.

Interesting.

Chapter 92

After some much-needed R amp; R I went back to work and found that I was still assigned to the extortion/terrorism case, which apparently now involved chasing down whoever was responsible, whoever had the money. I was told that I was picked because I'm relentless.

In a way, I was glad it wasn't over. I was still in touch with several of my contacts on the case: Martin Lodge in England, Sandy Greenberg with Interpol, Etienne Marteau in Paris, but also police and intelligence in Tel Aviv and Frankfurt. Everybody I talked to had possible leads, but no one had anything hot, or even what I would consider lukewarm.

The Wolf, or maybe al Qaeda, or some other clever, homicidal bastards were out there with close to two billion dollars in their coffers. Among other things, three city blocks in Paris had been destroyed. Political prisoners had been released. There had to be some slipup, some way to find them, or at least some way to discover who they were.

My second day back, the analyst Monnie Donnelley and I made a paper connection that interested me enough to drive all the way out to Lexington, Virginia. I arrived at a two-story contemporary on a back road called Red Hawk Lane. A Dodge Durango was parked in the driveway. A couple of horses grazed in a nearby paddock.

Joe Cahill met me at the door of the house. The former CIA agent was all smiles, just as I remembered him from past meetings about the Wolf. Joe had told me over the phone that he was eager to help the investigation in any way he could. He invited me inside and had coffee and a store-bought crumb cake waiting in his den. The room had views of an outlying pasture, a pond, and the Blue Ridge Mountains off in the distance.

"I guess you can tell I miss the job," Joe said. "Some days, anyway. You can do only so much hunting and fishing. You fish, Alex? You hunt?"

"I've taken the kids fishing a couple of times," I said. "I hunt some, yeah. Right now, I'm hoping to bag the Wolf. I need your help, though, Joe. I want to go over some old ground. Something has come up."

Chapter 93

"All right, you want to talk about him again. How we got the Wolf out of Russia? What happened once he arrived in America? How he disappeared after that? It's a sad but well-known and documented story, Alex. You've seen the files. I know you have. Almost ended my career."

"Joe, I don't understand why nobody seems to know who he is. What he looks like. His real name. That's the story I've been getting for over a year now, but how can it be? How could we work with England to extricate an important KGB guy, and not know who he is. Something bad happened in Paris-but nobody knows what. How is it possible? What am I missing? What has everybody missed so far?"

Joe Cahill spread his large workingman hands, palms up. "Look, I obviously don't have all the pieces, either. It's my understanding that he was undercover when he was inside Russia. Supposedly, he was a young, very cagey agent, which would mean he's still only in his early forties. But I've also read reports that he's in his late fifties or sixties now. That he was actually pretty high up in the KGB when he defected. I've also heard that the Wolf is female. I think he spreads the rumors himself. I'm almost certain that's what he does."

"Joe, you and your old partner were his controls once he got here."

"Our boss was Tom Weir, who wasn't the director yet. Actually, the team included three other guys-Maddock, Boykin, and Graebner. Maybe you should talk to them."

Cahill rose from his easy chair. He went and opened French doors leading out to a stone patio. A cooling breeze swept into the room.

"I never met him, Alex. Neither did my partner, Corky Hancock. Or the rest of the team-Jay, Sam, Clark. That's the way it was set up from the beginning. It was the deal he brokered when he came out of Russia. He'd help us bring down the old KGB, name names there, and here in the U.S. But nobody got to see him. Believe me, he delivered names and information that helped bring down the evil empire."

I nodded. "Right, he keeps his promises. But now he's on the loose, and he's established his own crime network-and a whole lot more."

Cahill took a bite of his coffee cake, then talked with his mouth full. "Apparently, that's exactly what he did. Of course, we had no idea that he would go bad. Neither did the Brits. Maybe Tom Weir did. I don't know."

I needed some air. I got up and walked to the open doors. A couple of horses were hugging a white wooden fence under the shade of oak trees. I turned to face Joe Cahill.

"Okay, so you can't help me with the Wolf. What can you help me with, Joe?"

Cahill frowned and looked confused. "I'm sorry, Alex, not much. I'm an old plow horse, not good for much of anything anymore. Coffee cake's good, right?"

I shook my head. "Not really, Joe. Trust me, store-bought's never the same."

Cahill's face sagged, then he grinned but his eyes weren't smiling. "So now we're gonna be honest, I guess. Why the hell are you here? What's this about? Talk to Uncle Joe. What's going on? I'm kind of lost. You're playing way over my head."

I stepped back into the room. "Oh, it's all about the Wolf, Joe. See, I think you and your old partner can help us a lot-even if you never met him in person, and I'm not so sure that you didn't."

Cahill finally threw up his hands in frustration. "Alex, this is a little crazy, you know. I feel like we're running around in circles. I'm too old and ornery for this shit."

"Yeah, well, it's been a tough couple of weeks for everybody. A lot of craziness going around. You don't know the half of it." But I'd had enough of "Uncle" Joe Cahill's crap. I showed him a photograph.

"Take a good look. This is the woman who murdered CIA Director Weir at the Hoover Building."

Cahill shook his head. "Okay. So?"

"Her name is Nikki Williams and she's former army. She operated as a mercenary for a while. A sniper, a good one. Lots of private contracts on her résumé. I know what you're going to say, Joe- so?"

"Yeah. So?"

"Once upon a time, she worked for you and your partner, Hancock. Your agency shared your files with us, Joe. New era of cooperation. Here's the real twist- I think you hired her to kill Weir.

"Maybe you did it through Geoffrey Shafer, but you were involved. I think you work for the Wolf. Maybe you always have-maybe that was part of his deal, too."

"You're crazy, and you're dead wrong!" Joe Cahill stood up and brushed crumbs from his trousers. "You know what else, I think you'd better leave now. I'm sorry as hell I invited you into my house. This little talk of ours is over."

"No, Joe," I said, "actually, it's just getting started."

Chapter 94

I made a call on my cell phone. Minutes later, agents from Langley and Quantico swarmed onto the property and arrested Joe Cahill. They cuffed him and dragged him out of his nice, peaceful house in the country.

We had a lead now, maybe a good one.

Joe Cahill was transported to a CIA safe house somewhere in the Alleghenies. The grounds and the home looked ordinary enough: a two-story fieldstone farmhouse surrounded by grapevines and fruit trees, the entryway thick with wisteria. But this wasn't going to be a safe house for Uncle Joe.

The former agent was bound and gagged, then left alone in a small room for several hours.

To think about his future-and his past.

A CIA doctor arrived: a tall, paunchy man who looked to be in his late thirties, horsey, WASPish. His name was Jay O'Connell. He told us that an experimental truth serum had been approved for use on Cahill. O'Connell explained that variations of the drug were currently being used on terrorist prisoners at various prisons.

"It's a barbiturate, like sodium amytal and brevital," he said. "All of a sudden the subject will feel slightly drunk, diminished senses. After that, he won't be able to defend himself very well against prodding questions. At least, we hope not. Subjects can react differently. We'll see with this guy. He's older, so I'm fairly confident we'll nail him."

"What's the worst we can expect?" I asked O'Connell.

"That'd be cardiac arrest. Oh hell, it's a joke. Well, actually, I guess it isn't."

It was early in the morning when Joe Cahill was moved out of the small holding room and brought into a larger one in the cellar with no windows. His blindfold and gag were removed, but not the binds around his wrists. We sat him in a straight-backed chair.

Cahill blinked his eyes repeatedly before he could tell where he was and who else was in the room with him.

"Disorientation techniques. Won't work worth a crap on me," he said. "This is really dumb. Nonsense. It's horseshit."

"Yes, we think so, too," said Dr. O'Connell. He turned to one of the agents, Larry Ladove. "Roll up his sleeve for me anyway. There we go. This will pinch. Then it'll sting. Then you'll spill out your guts to us."

Chapter 95

For the next three and a half hours, Cahill continued to slur his words badly and to act like a man who had half a dozen drinks or more in him, and was ready for more.

"I know what you guys are doing," Uncle Joe said, and shook a finger at the three of us in the room with him.

"We know what you're doing, too," said the CIA guy, Ladove. "And what you've done."

"Haven't done anything. Innocent until proven guilty. Besides, if you know so much, why are we talking?"

"Joe, where is the Wolf?" I asked him. "What country? Give us something."

"Don't know," Cahill said, then laughed as if something he'd said was funny. "All these years, I don't know. I don't. "

"But you've met him?" I said.

"Never seen him. Not once, not even in the beginning. Very smart, clever. Paranoid, maybe. Doesn't miss a trick, though. Interpol might have seen him during the transport. Tom Weir? The Brits, maybe. Had him for a while before we got him." We'd already checked with London, but they had nothing substantial about the defection. And there was nothing about a mistake in Paris.

"How long have you been working with him?" I asked Cahill.

He looked for an answer on the ceiling. "Working for him, you mean?"

"Yes. How long?"

"Long time. Sold out early in the game. Jesus, long time ago." Cahill started to laugh again. "Lot of us did-CIA, FBI, DEA. So he claims. I believe him."

I said, "He gave you orders to have Thomas Weir killed. You already told us that." Which he hadn't.

"Okay," he said. "If I did, I did. Whatever the hell you say."

"Why did he want Thomas Weir killed?" I continued. "Why Weir? What happened between them?"

"Doesn't work that way. You just get your job. You never see the whole plan. But there was something between him and Weir-bad blood.

"Anyway, he sure as hell never contacted me. Always my partner. Always Hancock. He's the one who got the Wolf out of Russia. Corky, the Germans, the Brits. I told you that, right?" Cahill said, then winked at us. "This stuff is good. Truth serum. Drink the grape juice, boys." He looked over at O'Connell. "You, too, Dr. Mengele. Drink the fucking grape and the truth will set you free."

Chapter 96

Had we gotten the truth out of Joe Cahill? Was there anything to his drug-induced ramblings?

Corky Hancock? The Germans, the Brits? Thomas Weir?

Somebody had to know something about the Wolf. Where he was. Who he was. What he might be up to next.

So I was on the road again, tracking down the Wolf. Joe Cahill's partner had moved out to the central Idaho Rockies after he had taken early retirement. He lived on the outskirts of Hailey in the Wood River Valley, about a dozen miles south of Sun Valley. Not a bad life for a former spook.

As we drove from the airport to Hailey we passed through what the Bureau driver described as "high desert." Hancock, like Joe Cahill, was a hunter and fisherman, it seemed. Silver Creek Preserve, a world-famous catch-and-release fishing area, was nearby.

"We're not going to bust in on Hancock. We'll keep him under surveillance. Try to see what he's up to. He's off in the mountains, hunting, right now. We'll run by his place. Let you have a look," said the local senior agent, a young Turk named Ned Rust. "Hancock is an expert shot with a rifle, by the way. Thought I'd mention that."

We drove up into the hills, where several of the larger houses seemed to be on five-to-ten-acre lots. Some homes had well-manicured lawns, which looked unnaturally green in contrast to the ashen hills, which, of course, were natural.

"There have been avalanches in the area recently," Rust said as we drove. He was just chock full of information. "Might see some wild horses. Or Bruce Willis. Demi and Ashton and the kids. Anyway, there's Hancock's house up ahead. Exterior's river rock. Popular around here. Lot of house for a retired agent with no family."

"He's probably got some money to spend on himself," I said.

The house was large all right, and handsome, with spectacular views in three directions. There was a detached barn that was bigger than my house, and a couple of horses grazing nearby. No Corky Hancock, though; he was off hunting.

Well, so was I.

Nothing much happened in Hailey for the next few days. I was briefed by the senior agent in charge, a man named William Koch. The CIA had also sent a heavy from Washington, Bridget Rooney. Hancock returned from his hunting outing, and we watched his every move. Static surveillance was set up by an operations group that had been flown in from Quantico. There was a mobile team whenever Hancock left the house. We were taking him very seriously. After all, the Wolf was out there somewhere, with close to two billion dollars. In winnings.

But maybe we finally had a way to track him: the CIA agent who brought him out of Russia. And maybe it was all connected to whatever had happened between the Wolf and Thomas Weir.

The mistake in Paris.

Chapter 97

It just wasn't going to happen overnight. Or the next night. Or the one after that.

On Friday I got permission to take a trip out to Seattle to visit my boy. I called Christine, who said that it would be fine and that Alex would be happy to see me-and so would she. I'd noticed the edge was gone from Christine's voice when we talked these days; sometimes I could even remember how it had been between us. I wasn't sure that was a good thing, though.

I arrived at her house in the late morning and was struck again by what a warm and charming place it was. The house and the yard were very Christine: cozy and light, with the familiar white picket fence and matching handrails hugging the stone steps leading to the front door; rosemary, thyme, and mint filled the herb garden. Everything just so.

Christine answered the bell herself, with Alex in her arms. As much as I tried not to, I couldn't help thinking about the way things might have been if I hadn't been a homicide cop and my life as a detective hadn't violently derailed the two of us.

I was surprised that she was home, and she must have recognized the look in my eyes.

"I won't bite you, Alex, I promise. I brought Alex back from preschool to be with you," she said. Then she handed over the Boy, and he was all I wanted to think about right then.

"Hello, Dada," he said, and laughed shyly, which is his way at first. I smiled back. A woman I know in the D.C. area calls me "a saint," and she doesn't mean it as a compliment. I'm not, not even close, but I have learned to make the best of things. My guess is that she hasn't.

"You're such a big boy," I said, expressing my surprise, and I suppose, my pride and delight in my son. "How old are you now? Six? Eight? Twelve years old?" I asked.

"I'm two, almost three," he said, and laughed at my joke. He always gets me, at least he seems to.

"He's been talking about seeing you all morning, Alex. He kept saying, 'Today's Daddy day,'" Christine said. "You two have fun together." Then she did something that surprised me: she leaned in and kissed my cheek. That kind of threw me. I may be cautious, even a little paranoid, but I'm not immune. First Kayla Coles-and now Christine. Maybe I looked as though I needed a little TLC. That was probably it.

Well, Alex and I did have some good times together. I acted as if Seattle were our hometown, and I went with it. First we rode over to the Fremont area, where I had visited a retired detective friend a few years back. Fremont was full of older buildings, lots of vintage clothing and furniture shops, character, if such a worthy trait can actually be traced to architecture and style. A lot of people seem to think it can, but I'm not so sure.

When we got there, Little Alex and I shared a scone with butter and blackberry jam from the Touchstone Bakery. We continued on our walking tour, and closely examined the fifty-five-foot-tall Fremont Rocket attached to one of the local stores. Then I bought Alex a tie-dyed kite, and we took it for a test flight at Gas Works Park, which had a view of Lake Union and downtown Seattle. Seattle has parks galore. It's one of the things I like so much about the city. I wondered if I could ever live out here and imagined that I could, and then I wondered why I was entertaining that line of thought at all. Because Christine had given me a quick little peck on the cheek? Was I that starved for affection? Pitiful.

We did some more exploring, and checked out the sculpture garden and the Fremont Troll, a large sculpture that reminded me of the singer Joe Cocker clutching a Volkswagen Bug in one hand. Finally we had a late lunch-organic, of course-a roasted vegetable salad, plus peanut butter and jelly on Ezekiel bread. When in Rome, and all that.

"Life is pretty good out here, huh, buddy?" I said as we munched our food together. "This is the best, little guy."

Alex Junior nodded that it was good, but then he stared up at me all wide-eyed and innocent, and asked, "When are you coming home, Daddy?"

Oh man, oh man. When am I coming home?

Chapter 98

Christine had asked that I have Alex home before six, and I did as I'd promised. I am so responsible, so Alex, it drives me a little crazy sometimes. She was waiting for us on the porch, in a bright blue dress and heels, and handled everything as well as I could have expected her to. She smiled warmly when she saw us, and hugged Alex against her long legs when he ran up to her squealing, "Mommy!"

"You two look like you had some fun," she said as she stroked the top of the Big Boy's head. "That's nice. I knew you would. Alex, Daddy has to go to his house now. Back to Washington, D.C. You and I have to go to Theo's for dinner."

Tears filled his eyes. "I don't want Daddy to go," he protested.

"I know, but he has to, sweetheart. Daddy has to go to work. Give him a hug. He'll come visit again."

"I will. Of course I will," I said, wondering who Theo was. "I'll always come see you."

Alex ran into my arms, and I loved having him close and didn't want to let him go. I loved the smell of him, his touch, the feeling of his little heart beating. But I also didn't want him to feel the separation that was already making my heart ache.

"I'll be back real soon," I said. "Soon as I can. Don't get too big when I'm not looking."

And Alex whispered, "Please don't go away, Daddy. Please don't go."

He kept repeating it over and over until I was inside my rental car and driving away, waving back to my son, who kept getting smaller and smaller, until he disappeared as I turned the corner of his street. I could still feel Alex's little body pressing against mine. I can still feel it now.

Chapter 99

A little before eight that night I sat alone at the dimly lit bar inside the Kingfish Café on Nineteenth and Mercer in Seattle. I was lost in thoughts about my youngest son-all of my children, really-when Jamilla rolled into the restaurant.

She had on a long black leather car coat, with a dark blouse and black skirt, and she smiled brilliantly when she saw me sitting there at the bar, maybe looking as good to her as she did to me. Maybe. The thing about Jamilla is that she's pretty but doesn't seem to know it, at least to believe it. I had mentioned I was coming to Seattle, and Jam said she'd fly up to have dinner with me.

At first I hadn't been sure it was a good idea, but that was wrong, all wrong. I was incredibly happy to see her, especially after leaving Alex.

"You look good, Sugar," she whispered against my cheek. "But you do seem a little beat-up, darling. You're working too hard. Burning the candle down."

"I feel a lot better right now," I told her. "You look good enough for both of us."

"I do? Well, thank you for saying that. Believe me, I needed to hear it."

The Kingfish, as it turned out, was a totally democratic restaurant: no reservations, but we were seated quickly at a nice table along the wall. We ordered drinks and food, but mostly we were there to hold hands and talk about everything that was going on in our lives.

"This thing with Little Alex," I told Jamilla about midway through dinner, "it's the worst torture for me. Goes against who I am, everything I learned from Nana. I can't stand to leave him here."

Jamilla frowned and seemed angry. "Doesn't she treat him well?"

"Oh no, no, Christine is a good mother. It's the separation that kills me. I love that little boy, and I miss him so much every day I'm away from him. I miss the way he talks, walks, thinks, tells bad jokes, listens to mine. We're pals, Jam."

"And so," Jamilla said, holding my eyes with hers, "you escape into your work."

"And so"-I nodded-"I do. But that's a whole 'nother story. Hey, let's get out of here."

"What do you have in mind, Agent Cross?"

"Nothing illegal, Inspector Hughes."

"Hmmm. Really? Well, that's a shame."

Chapter 100

You've heard the saying get a room? Well, I already had one at the Fairmont Olympic on University across from Ranier Square, and I couldn't wait to get there. Neither of us could. Jamilla whistled under her breath as we walked into the impressive lobby. She stared up at the engraved ceiling, which must have been forty feet high. There was an actual hush inside the large, overdecorated room at a little past ten when we arrived.

"Italian Renaissance decor, big ol' antique chandeliers, five stars, five diamonds. I'm wonderfully impressed," Jam said, grinning. As always, her enthusiasm was exhilarating.

"Every once in a while you just have to build in a treat, you know."

"This is definitely a treat, Alex," Jamilla said, and gave me a quick kiss in the lobby. "I'm really happy you're here. And that I'm here, too. I like us a lot."

It kept getting better from there. Our room was on the tenth floor and it was everything it needed to be-bright, airy, plush, with a king-size bed. We even had a view of Elliott Bay with Bainbridge Island in the distance, and a ferry just leaving the waterfront in the foreground. The sights and scenes couldn't have been any better if I'd planned them out in elaborate detail, which maybe, just maybe, I had.

About that king-size bed at the Fairmont Olympic. It was covered with a gold-and-green-striped comforter-a duvet?-I'm always slightly confused about what distinguishes the two. We didn't bother to remove the comforter/duvet. We just fell onto it, laughing and talking, happy to be there together, realizing how much we'd missed each other.

"Let me make you a little more comfortable, Alex," Jam whispered as she pulled my shirt out of my pants. "How's that? Better?"

"And I'll do the same for you. Only fair," I said to her. "Tit for tat."

"Well, yes, I do like that tat of yours."

I began to unbutton Jamilla's blouse and she continued unbuttoning my shirt. Neither of us was in a hurry. We knew better than to rush any of this. The whole idea was to make it last, to pay attention to each detail, each button, the feel of the fabric, the tiny bumps of anticipation on Jamilla's skin, and on mine, the difficulty catching our breath, the tingle in our bodies, the electricity, sparks, whatever goodness came our way that night.

"You've been practicing," she whispered, and she was already a little short of breath. I liked that.

I laughed. "Uh-uh. Actually, I've been practicing the art of anticipation."

"Like this next button?" she asked.

"Beautiful, isn't it?"

"And the one after that?"

"I don't know how much more of this I can take, Jamilla. I'm not kidding."

"We'll have to see. We'll just have to see. I'm not kidding, either."

When Jamilla's blouse and my shirt were undone, we slowly pulled them off. Meanwhile, we kept kissing, tickling, scratching, nuzzling, ever so slowly. She was wearing perfume and I recognized it as Calèche Eau Delicate. She knew I liked the scent. Jamilla loved a light scratch all over her body so that's what I did next. First the shoulders and back, then her arms, her beautiful face, the long legs, her feet, then back up her legs again.

"You're getting warm… warmer," she sighed, and laughed very deep in her throat.

Then we slid back off the bed and stood together, swaying and touching. Finally I took off her bra and held her breasts in my hands. "Like I said, I don't know how much more of this I can take."

I didn't, either. I was hard, so hard that it hurt. I slid down and knelt on the Oriental rug. I kissed Jamilla down there. She was strong and confident, and maybe that's why I liked kneeling before her like this. In awe? Out of respect? Something like that.

Finally I pushed myself up again. "Okay?" I whispered.

"Okay. Whatever you say. I'm your slave. Your master? A little of each?"

I went inside Jamilla while we were still standing, dancing in place, but then we tilted down and dropped onto the bed. I was lost in the moment, lost in Jamilla Hughes, and that was exactly where I needed to be. She was making these tiny sighs and gasps that I loved.

"I missed being with you," I whispered. "I missed your smile, the sound of your voice, everything."

"Ditto," she said, and laughed. "But especially that tat of yours."

Moments later, five, maybe ten minutes, the phone on the nightstand began to ring.

For once, I did the right thing-I knocked the damn thing onto the floor, then covered it with a pillow. If it was the Wolf, he could call back in the morning.

Chapter 101

The next morning I headed back to the Idaho Rockies. Jamilla and I shared a cab out to the airport, then took separate planes going in different directions. "Big mistake. Dumb move," she told me before we parted. "You should just fly to San Francisco with me. You need some extended R and R." I already knew that.

But it wasn't going to be. Corky Hancock was the biggest lead we had, and the surveillance on him had been tightening. There was nowhere Hancock could go in the state of Idaho and not be watched, or at least listened to. There was surveillance on his house, the surrounding acreage, even the stand-alone barn. We had four mobile teams on him, with four more in the wings if needed. Since I'd left, aerial surveillance had been added to the mix.

In Idaho, I attended a meeting of more than two dozen agents assigned to the detail. The meeting was held in a small movie house in Sun Valley. The movie 21 Grams with Sean Penn and Naomi Watts was playing there in the evenings, but not during the day.

Senior Agent William Koch stood in front of us. Tall and gangly, impressive in his way, he wore a chambray shirt, jeans, scuffed black cowboy boots. He played the local guy to a T, but he was nobody's fool and he wanted us to know it. The same was true for his CIA counterpart, Bridget Rooney, a confident, dark-haired woman who was smarter than a whip.

"I'll make this pretty simple for everybody. Either Hancock knows we're here or he's just unbelievably careful by nature," said Koch. "He hasn't talked to anybody since we got here. He's been online-eBay for fishing rods, a couple of porn sites, a fantasy baseball league. He has a girlfriend named Coral Lee, who lives nearby in Ketchum. Asian American girl. Coral is definitely a good looker. Corky isn't. We figured he probably spends lots of money on her, and it turns out, he does. Slightly less than two hundred thousand so far this year. Trips, jewelry, one of those cute little Lexus convertibles the gals like."

Koch paused and looked around the room. "That's about it. Except we know that Hancock is connected to the Wolf and that he's been paid a lot of money for his services. So at twelve hundred hours, we're going in to take a look for ourselves inside the house. So tired," Agent Koch said in a singsong. "Tired of waiting."

There were smiles around the room, even from those who didn't get the reference to the Kinks song. Somebody patted me on the shoulder, as though I had something to do with the decision that must have come down from Washington.

"Not me." I turned and shrugged at the agent congratulating me. "I'm just a soldier here."

The team going inside Hancock's place was mostly FBI, but there was a handful of CIA agents, too, led by Rooney. The CIA was in Idaho as a courtesy, partly because of the new working relationship that existed between the two agencies, but mostly because Hancock was directly involved in the murder of Thomas Weir, one of theirs. But I doubted they wanted to take Hancock down any more than I did. I wanted the Wolf, and somehow, somewhere, I was going to get him. At least, that was what I needed to think.

Chapter 102

Koch and Rooney were in charge, and they finally gave us the go. At the appointed hour, we swarmed all over the Hancock house. FBI-emblazoned shirts and windbreakers were everywhere. Probably scared off a few deer and jackrabbits, even though not a single shot was fired.

Hancock was in bed with his girlfriend. He was sixty-four years old; Coral was supposed to be twenty-six. Lustrous black hair, good figure, lots and lots of rings and things, slept in the nude, on her back. Hancock at least had the decency to wear a Utah Jazz sweatshirt and sleep in a fetal position.

He began to shout at us, which was actually kind of ironic and funny. "What the hell is this shit? Get out of my damn house!"

But he forgot to look surprised, or he just wasn't a good actor. Either way, I got the feeling that he knew we were coming. How? Because he'd spotted us over the past few days? Or had Hancock been warned by someone in one of the cooperating agencies? Did the Wolf know we were onto Hancock?

During the first couple of hours of interviews, we tried Dr. O'Connell's truth serum on Hancock. It didn't work as well on him as it had with Joe Cahill. He got happy and high, but he just sat back and went with it. Didn't tell us much, wouldn't even confirm things that Cahill had already confessed.

Meanwhile, a search of the house, barn, and sixty acres of grounds was going on. Hancock owned an Aston Martin convertible-and the Wolf loved fast cars-but nothing else even vaguely suspicious turned up. Not for three whole days, during which nearly a hundred agents combed every square inch of the ranch. During that time, half a dozen computer experts-including loaners from Intel and IBM-tried to break into Hancock's two computers. They finally concluded that he'd had experts put up extra security to protect whatever was inside.

There was nothing to do but wait around some more. I read every magazine and newspaper in Hancock's house, including several back issues of the Idaho Mountain Express. I went for long walks and tried to figure out a direction for my life that made some sense to me. I didn't do real well, but the fresh mountain air was a nice treat for my lungs.

When a computer breakthrough finally came, there wasn't much to go on. No direct link to the Wolf or to anyone else who seemed suspicious to us, at least not at first.

The next day, though, a hacker from our offices in Austin, Texas, found a file inside an encrypted file. It contained regular communication with a bank in Zurich. Actually, with a couple of banks in Switzerland.

And suddenly we didn't just suspect, we knew that Hancock had a lot of money. Over six million. At least that much. Which was the best news we'd had in a long while.

So off to Zurich we went, at least for a day or two. I didn't expect to find the Wolf there. But you never know. And I'd never been to Switzerland. Jannie begged me to bring back chocolate, a suitcase full of the stuff, and I promised I would. A whole suitcase full of Swiss chocolate, sweetheart. Least I can do for missing most of your ninth year.

Chapter 103

If I were the Wolf, this would be a good place to live. Zurich is a beautiful, amazingly clean city on the lake-the Zürichsee-with lovely fragrant shade trees and wide, winding sidewalks along the water, and fresh mountain air meant to be breathed in deeply. When I arrived, a storm was imminent and the air smelled like brass. The exterior of a majority of the buildings were in light shades, sand and white, and several were adorned with Swiss flags twisting in the blustery wind off the lake.

As I drove into the city I noticed trolley tracks everywhere with heavy-looking wires hanging overhead. The power of the old. Also several life-size fiberglass cows painted with Alpine scenes, which reminded me of Little Alex's favorite toy, Moo. What was I going to do about Alex? What could I do?

The Zurich Bank was a sixties-looking building, glass-and-steel front, situated very close to the lake. Sandy Greenberg met me outside. She was wearing a gray suit, had a black handbag slung over her shoulder, and looked as though maybe she worked inside the bank instead of for Interpol.

"You ever been to Zurich, Alex?" Sandy asked as she gave me a hug and kiss on both cheeks.

"Never. Had one of their multipurpose knives once when I was ten or eleven."

"Alex, we have to eat a meal here. Promise me. Let's go inside now. They're waiting for us, and they don't like to wait in Zurich. Especially the bankers."

The inside of the Zurich Bank was expensive-looking, highly polished, wood paneling everywhere, as spotless as a hospital operating room. The teller area was natural stone, with more wood paneling. The tellers were efficient and professional-looking, and they whispered to one another. The bank's branding was understated, but there was a great deal of modern art on the wall. I thought that I understood: the art was the bank's branding.

"Zurich has always been a haven for avant-garde intellectuals, cultured types," Sandy said, and didn't whisper. "The Dada movement was born here. Wagner, Strauss, Jung all lived here."

"James Joyce wrote Ulysses in Zurich," I said, and winked at her.

Sandy laughed. "I forgot, you're a closet intellectual."

We were escorted to the bank president's office, which had a serious look. Neat as a pin, too. Only one transaction on the desk blotter, everything else filed away.

Sandy handed Mr. Delmar Pomeroy an envelope. "A signed warrant," she said. "The account number is 616479Q."

"Everything has been promptly arranged," Herr Pomeroy said to us. That was all. Then his warrant officer took us to look at the transactions in and out of account number 616479Q. So much for the secrecy and security of Swiss banks. Everything has been promptly arranged.

Chapter 104

This was feeling more like an efficient, orderly police investigation now. Even though I knew it really wasn't. Sandy, two of her agents from Interpol, and I got to look through all of Corky Hancock's transactions in a small, windowless room somewhere deep in the basement of the Zurich Bank. The former CIA agent's account had grown from two hundred thousand U.S. dollars to slightly over six million. Youza.

The latest, and largest, deposits totaled three and a half million and had come in four installments this year.

The source of the payment was an account in the name of Y. Jikhomirov. It took us a couple of hours to track down all of the records. There were more than a hundred pages going all the way back to '91. The year the Wolf had been brought out of Russia. Coincidence? I didn't believe in them. Not anymore.

We carefully examined withdrawals from the Jikhomirov account. They included payments to a company that leased private jets; regular air travel with British Airways and Air France; hotels: Claridge's, the Bel-Air in L.A., the Sherry-Netherland in New York, the Four Seasons in Chicago and Maui. There were wire transfers to America, South Africa, Australia, Paris, Tel Aviv. The trail of a Wolf?

And an entry that particularly caught my interest-the purchase of four expensive sports cars in France, all from a dealership in Nice, Riviera Motors. A Lotus, a special-edition Jaguar, and two Aston Martins.

"The Wolf is supposed to be a sports car enthusiast," I said to Sandy. "Maybe the cars mean something. Maybe we're closer than we suspect. What do you think?"

She nodded agreement. "Yes, I think we should visit Riviera Motors in Nice. Nice is nice. But first, Alex, lunch in Zurich. I made you a promise."

"No, I think you made me promise. After my bad Swiss Army knife joke."

I was hungry anyway, so it seemed a good idea. Sandy chose the Veltliner Keller, one of her favorites-a restaurant she thought I would appreciate.

As we entered, she explained that Veltliner Keller had been a restaurant since 1551, a long time for any business to survive. So we forgot about police work for an hour and a half. We dined on barley soup, zuppe engadinese; a casserole, veltliner topf; and very good wine. Everything was just so: crisp white linens and napkins, roses in sterling vases, crystal salt and pepper shakers.

"This is one of your better ideas," I told Sandy near the end of the meal. "A nice break in the action."

"It's called lunch, Alex. You have to try it more. You should come to Europe with your friend, Jamilla. You're working too hard."

"It shows, I guess."

"No, actually you look as good as ever. You're holding up better than Denzel-in his latest movies, anyway. Somehow you persevere. I don't know how, but you do. But I can tell that you're twisted up inside. Eat, relax, then we'll go to Nice and check out some sports cars. It will be like a holiday. Maybe we'll even catch a killer. Finish your wine, Alex."

"Right," I said, "and then I have to buy some chocolate for Jannie. A suitcase full. I made another promise."

"Didn't you promise to catch the Wolf?" Sandy asked.

"Yeah, that too."

Chapter 105

Next stop, a luxury-car dealership in Nice. I felt as if I were in an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

The owner of Riviera Motors, the "concessionnaire exclusif Jaguar, Aston Martin, Lotus," appeared to like drama, too, at least in a design sense. To that effect, a long row of gleaming black cars was displayed in the showroom. The cars were clearly visible from the street through monumental bay windows. The shiny black machines cut a startling contrast to a spotless white floor.

"What do you think?" Sandy asked as we climbed out of our rented Peugeot, which we had parked across the street from the dealership.

"I think I need a new car," I said to her. "And I know the Wolf likes fancy sports cars."

We went inside and stopped at the reception desk in front. Behind it was an elegant reception person, well tanned with a bleached and ironed ponytail. She was checking Sandy and me out: Both over six feet; ebony and ivory. Who are these people?

"We're here to see Monsieur Garnier," Sandy said to the woman in French.

"You have an appointment with Monsieur, madame?"

"We do indeed. Interpol and the FBI, respectively-and respectfully, I might add. Monsieur Garnier is expecting us, I believe. We're here on important business."

While we waited, I continued to take in the place. The expensive cars were precisely parked in a herringbone pattern, interspersed with voluminous potted plants. In an adjacent service atelier, mechanics in matching Jaguar-green jumpsuits worked with pristine tools.

The manager of the car dealership appeared after a couple of minutes' wait. He was dressed in a fashionable gray suit, but not too flashy, just clearly expensive and right.

"You've come about a couple of Aston Martins, a Jaguar, a Lotus?" he asked.

"Something like that, monsieur," Sandy told him. "Let's go up to your office. We wouldn't want to hurt business by talking down here in the showroom."

The manager smiled. "Oh, believe me, madame, our business is bulletproof."

"We'll see about that," I told him in French. "Or maybe a better way of putting it: let's try and keep it that way. This is a murder investigation."

Chapter 106

The manager suddenly became extremely polite and cooperative. The four luxury cars in question had been purchased by an M. Aglionby, who apparently had a home nearby on the beautiful peninsula, Cap-Ferrat, just east of Nice. Monsieur Garnier told us it was "off the Basse Corniche, the main coastal road to Monaco. You can't miss it. And you won't miss the Aglionby estate."

"To Catch a Thief," Sandy said as we sped along toward Cap-Ferrat about two hours later. We had lost a little time calling in backup.

"Actually, the most memorable shots in the Hitchcock movie were filmed up there," Sandy went on. She pointed toward a parallel road winding along the cliffs; it was at least a hundred yards higher than the one we were driving on. In other words, very high up, and dangerous-looking.

"Also, we're here to catch a mass murderer without any conscience," I said, "not a witty and charming cat burglar like Cary Grant was in the flick."

"This is true, too. Keep me focused, Alex. I could easily get distracted here," Sandy said. But I knew she was focused-always. That's why we got along so well.

The Aglionby estate was located on the west side of Cap-Ferrat, in Villefranche-sur-Mer. There were glimpses of villas and gardens hidden behind high stucco and rock walls as we rode along D125, also known as boulevard Circulaire. Half a dozen cars and vans followed us, also catching the sights, no doubt: a shiny blue Rolls-Royce convertible easing out of one of the estates, with a blonde in sunglasses and a kerchief behind the wheel; dark-glassed tourists catching rays on the terrace of the Grand Hôtel du Cap-Ferrat; a bathing pool dug into solid rock at Piscine de Sun beach.

"You think this is a fool's errand, Alex?" Sandy asked.

"It's what we do. Hit and miss, hunt and peck. I feel good about this one. It has to be something. Monsieur Aglionby has to be connected somehow."

I was hopeful. We had found an awful lot of money in the account of Corky Hancock, and most of it had come in recently. But how much did he really know about the Wolf? How much did anyone know?

Then we saw the estate we were looking for-and Sandy drove past. " Got you, you bastard," she said. "Aglionby? The Wolf? Why not?"

"Whoever lives back there is certainly loaded. Jesus, how much is enough?"

"When you have a billion dollars or so, this is rather modest, Alex. It's not a question of a house-it's houses. The Riviera, London, Paris, Aspen."

"If you say so. I've never had a billion myself. Or a villa on the Riviera."

The place in question was a sun-drenched, Mediterranean-style mansion, creamy yellow with white detailing; it had gleaming balustrades and porticos, shutters that the staff apparently closed to the midday sun. Or maybe the people inside just didn't want to be seen? Four stories, thirty-plus rooms-as cozy as Versailles.

But for now all we were interested in was a peek. As we had planned earlier, we reconnoitered at a small hotel just up the coast. The decision was made by local police officials to use the estate bordering the Aglionby place on the south side. It was vacant now, except for a large staff. We would dress and pose as gardeners and household help, starting tomorrow morning.

Sandy and I listened to the plan as it was laid out, step by step. We looked at each other, shook our heads. Not this time.

I spoke. "We're going in tonight," I announced. "With or without your help."

Chapter 107

The decision to go right away was backed enthusiastically by Interpol, and even by the French in Paris, who were in close contact with Washington and wanted the murderous Wolf as badly as the rest of the world did, maybe more. For a change, everything happened very quickly that afternoon and through the early evening. I was going to be part of the assault, and so was Sandy.

The attack was planned as if the Wolf was definitely inside the villa. Seven two-person teams of snipers were deployed on all sides of the estate, which were designated as white (north), red (east), black (south), and green (west). Every door and window was covered, and each of the snipers had a specific number of targets. They were closest to the estate. Our eyes and ears.

So far, they weren't seeing any sign that we'd been spotted.

While the snipers moved into position, the rest of us-Interpol, the FBI, the French army and police-strapped on war gear: black Nomex flight suits, body armor, handguns, MP-5 submachine guns. Three helicopters were waiting less than a mile away and would be used during the assault. We were ready for the green light, but some of the more jaded among us expected a last-minute delay for politics, cold feet at the command level, something unforeseen to get in the way.

I lay flat on the ground on my stomach beside Sandy Greenberg. We were less than a hundred yards from the main house. Starting to feel the jitters. At least, I was. The Wolf could be inside this house; maybe he was Aglionby.

Some lights were on inside, but we seldom saw anyone at the windows past midnight. Security was modest on the grounds, just a couple of guards.

"Awfully quiet," said Sandy. "I don't know if I like this, Alex. Security's light."

"It's almost two in the morning."

"You surprised that we're going in?" Sandy asked.

I smiled. " Are we going in? No, I'm not surprised. Remember, the French want the Wolf. Maybe even more than we do."

Then the signal came to go! Sandy and I were part of the second assault team, and we ran toward the house about forty-five seconds after the first wave. We entered through the back- black. The kitchen, to be exact.

Somebody had switched on the overheads. A guard lay on the floor, his hands cuffed behind his head. Highly polished marble was everywhere, four stoves at the center of the room. I noticed a large glass bowl on a table. I took a peek at what looked like dark noses inside.

Figs, I finally realized, smiling to myself.

Then Sandy and I were running down a long hallway. No gunshots had been fired inside the house yet. Lots of other noise, though.

We came to the formal living room of diplomatic proportions: chandeliers dangled over our head, polished-marble floor, half a dozen dark and solemn paintings by French and Dutch masters.

No Wolf so far. No sign of him.

"This for entertaining, or signing treaties?" Sandy asked me. "Alex, why aren't they fighting back? What's going on? Is he here?"

We climbed a winding staircase and saw French soldiers leading men and women out of the bedrooms. Most were in their underwear; a few were naked. Nobody looked very sexy, but they certainly looked surprised.

I didn't see anybody who might be the Wolf, but how could I tell for certain what the Wolf looked like? How could anybody?

The interrogations began immediately right there in the hallways. Where is the Wolf?… Who is Aglionby?…

The entire house was searched a second time, then a third.

Marcel Aglionby wasn't at the house, we were told by several of the guests. He was on business in New York. One of his daughters was present; this was her party, her guests, her friends-though some of them looked to be twice her age. Her father was a respected banker, she swore to us. No way was he a criminal, no way was he the Wolf.

So is he the Wolf's banker? And where does that lead us?

I hated to think it, but I couldn't help myself: The Wolf wins again.

Chapter 108

We searched the place one more time and, over the threats of the daughter, started to take it apart, piece by piece.

I had to say the house was amazing, filled with antiques and artwork. Sandy thought that Aglionby might be trying to emulate the nearby La Fiorentina, which has been called the most beautiful house in the world. The banker certainly had expensive taste, and could afford to indulge them. Hand-painted Louis XVI pieces were everywhere, as were Louis XV chandeliers; antique Turkish carpets; Chinese screens and panels; tapestries; paintings, classical and modern, on nearly every wall. Works by Fragonard, Goya, Pieter Brueghel. All of it financed by the Wolf? Why not? He has over two billion to throw around.

We assembled the "suspects" in the billiards room, which had three billiards tables and nearly as many plush sofas as the living room. The same tailored formality. Did anyone here know anything about the Wolf? It didn't look that way to me. More likely, some of them might know Paris and Nicky Hilton.

"Does anyone want to speak for the group?" the French police commander addressed them.

No one volunteered; no one answered any questions. Either they didn't know or they had been told not to say.

"All right, then, let's separate them. We'll begin the interviews now. Someone will talk," the commander warned.

Since I hadn't been asked to participate in the interrogations, I wandered out onto the grounds and walked down toward the water. Had we been given another false lead to follow? The Wolf's game-playing, his strategies and counterstrategies, had been relentless from the beginning. Why should it stop now?

There was a large-actually, very long-wooden boathouse at the water's edge. It stood maybe a hundred yards from the main house. But what was this? Somebody had transformed the old boathouse into a garage to house a collection of more than thirty very expensive sports cars and luxury sedans. Maybe this was finally something. Evidence that the Wolf might have used this estate. Or was it another ruse, a tease?

I was standing between the boathouse and the water when all hell broke loose.

Chapter 109

All he had was his piece of the puzzle, his part in this terrible mission. But it was more than enough. Bari Naffis knew that there had been an incursion at the estate in Villefranche-sur-Mer and that within the hour people would die because of it, including friends of his and one girl he'd slept with, a fashion model from Hamburg. Eye candy to be sure, but very precious stuff.

The French army and police had already taken over the mansion. And now it was Bari's turn to go to work, to do his job. He didn't know why this had to happen, only that it did.

As he turned onto the D125, it seemed to him that he was already too late. But he had his orders. Someone had obviously foreseen that this would happen.

The Wolf had known it was coming, hadn't he? He had eyes in the back of his head. Eyes everywhere! What a scary bastard that one was.

That was all that Bari Naffis knew-and all he cared about right now. He had been well paid in advance, even if this made little sense to him and was highly distasteful. Why kill and maim so many?

Half an hour before, he'd received a radio signal from the main house; the noise had awakened him from a sound sleep in his hotel room.

He jumped from bed, dressed, then hurried to a prearranged position on an estate to the north. He tried not to think about his friends and a lover inside the house. Maybe she would survive somehow.

No matter. He wasn't going to cross the Wolf over some girl. Bari ran through the woods and thick brush cover. He was carrying a Man Portable Air Defense System, about as ungainly a weapon as there was. The missile launcher was five feet in length, a little over thirty-five pounds. Still, it was extremely well balanced and equipped with a rifle-style pistol grip and forestock. It fired an FIM-92A Stinger missile, and there were two other operators in the woods besides himself. Each of them had his little bit of work to do, his piece of the whole.

Three professional killers on the move at that very moment, maybe feeling the same misgivings he had.

A trap had been set for the police.

A terrible death trap for everybody in that house. Police killed as well. What a mess.

When he was in his final position, only about fifteen hundred feet from the main house, Bari hoisted the ungainly tube up onto his shoulder. He set his right hand on the pistol grip and sighted the weapon with his left. He held the launcher like a conventional rifle, though it was far from conventional.

He easily found his target in the viewfinder. He could hardly miss hitting a house. Then he waited for a final command in his earphones.

God, he didn't like this! He pictured the astonishingly pretty girl from Hamburg. Jeri was her name. So sweet, and what a perfect body. He waited, half hoping the signal wouldn't come. For Jeri's sake, for the sake of everyone inside.

But there it was! Electronic. Impersonal as a stranger's funeral. A whistling sound between his ears.

Two short, one long.

He took a deep breath, slowly exhaled. Then, reluctantly, he squeezed the trigger.

Bari felt a slight recoil, less than a rifle's, actually.

The launch engine inside the weapon ignited. The first-stage engine propelled the missile only about twenty to thirty feet, at which point it was safe for the secondary propulsion system to engage.

His eyes followed a vapor trail of solid rocket-fuel exhaust. The Stinger was on its way to the target. He heard a low roar as the missile accelerated to 1,500 miles per hour.

Be safe, Jeri.

The Stinger struck the estate broadside-a near perfect hit.

He was already reloading for the next shot.

Chapter 110

There were loud whooshing noises, and then fiery, hellish explosions everywhere I looked. Chaos reigned everywhere. And death as well.

French police and army personnel were frantically running for cover. A rocket or missile had struck the northern roofs of the villa, tossing slate, wood, and bricks from a chimney high into the air. Then a second missile struck. A third was only seconds behind.

I had started racing back toward the main house when I got another surprise out of nowhere.

A side door of the boathouse flew open and a dark blue Mercedes sedan roared up a gravel path toward the main road. I ran to a police sedan parked on the grass, started it up, and gave chase.

There wasn't time to tell anybody what I was doing. Not even Sandy. I wondered how a police car was going to keep up with a souped-up Mercedes. Probably not too well. No, probably not at all.

I stayed with the powerful CL55 out of Cap-Ferrat, all the way to the Basse Corniche. I nearly killed myself, and maybe a few others, on the twisty road, but I didn't lose whoever was speeding in front of me.

Who the hell was in the car? Why was somebody running? Could it be the Wolf?

Traffic toward Monaco was moving, but it was heavy. The lights from a tow truck up ahead indicated that some poor driver had jackknifed on this winding road. That was my one long-shot hope. The traffic was slowing down the Benz. But suddenly the Mercedes swung around and headed west.

The sports sedan was moving very fast past an endless array of billboards and restaurant signs. And so was I.

I rounded a curve, and the whole of the bay of Villefranche-sur-Mer appeared in all its inimitable beauty and splendor, the moon large and full in the sky. The city rose above the bay, which was filled with sailboats and yachts, like a rich kid's bathtub. The Mercedes spun down a slick, sloping hill, sometimes at a speed of a hundred miles per hour. I thought I remembered from somewhere that the car had close to five hundred horsepower. It sure seemed like it.

Then we were entering the old port of Nice, and I began to close the gap behind the sedan. The narrow streets were surprisingly crowded, especially around the bars and nightclubs, which seemed everywhere now, thank God.

The Mercedes barely avoided a drunken group coming out of the Etoile Filante nightclub.

And then, horn blaring, I roared through the same crowd, the pedestrians cursing and shaking fists at me.

The Mercedes made a sharp right-onto the N7, the Moyenne Corniche, a higher road.

I followed as best I could, knowing that I would probably lose him now. Lose who, though? Who was in the blue Mercedes?

The way up was incredibly steep and winding. We were headed back toward Monaco, but the traffic was light this way, and the Mercedes was effortlessly picking up speed. The driver had known to go backward in order to go forward-much faster-at a speed the police sedan couldn't possibly match.

After about two kilometers I was pretty sure I would lose him. We were back in Villefranche, but the highest part of town. The view down onto Cap-Ferrat and Beaulieu was breathtaking, and I couldn't avoid looking; even at this speed it filled my eyes like a painting.

I couldn't let him get away, and I pushed the police car up close to a hundred again. How long could I possibly keep up?

There was a tunnel, dimness, then almost total darkness-and at the end of the tunnel the astonishing sight of a medieval village perched high on a hillside.

EZEread a sign, and I wished I could go easy.

Just past the village, the road became even more dangerous. It was as if the Moyenne Corniche were taped onto the side of the cliffs. Down below, the color of the sea seemed to be changing from azure to opal to silver-gray.

I could smell oranges and lemons in the air. My senses were sharp. Fear can do that.

I was losing the Mercedes, though, so I made the only move I could. Instead of slowing around the next curve, I accelerated.

Chapter 111

I began to gain on the Mercedes and I kept my foot pressed to the floor. Are you suicidal? I wondered about myself.

Suddenly the Mercedes skidded all the way across the opposite lane. It struck the side of the mountain, a glancing blow, but very damaging to the car at that speed. Then it swerved back and forth on the road, across both lanes. It caromed off the rocks again. The blue sedan suddenly took off into the sky.

It was airborne, falling toward the sea.

I braked to the side of the road and jumped from my car. I saw the Mercedes hit the side of the cliff twice, then roll onto the lower highway far below. I couldn't get down there from where I was. Couldn't climb down, anyway.

I didn't see any movement from the wreck. Whoever was inside the Mercedes had to be dead. But who is it?

I got back in the police car I had commandeered at the estate. It took me close to ten minutes to make my way to the lower highway and the scene of the wreck. French police and an ambulance had already arrived and so had many early-morning onlookers.

As I climbed from my car, I could see that the body hadn't been removed from the wreckage. Medical workers were leaning inside the car and seemed to be working frantically. They were talking to whoever had been driving. Who was it?

One of them shouted, "He's still alive. One male! He's alive in here!"

I started to run toward the wreckage to get a look at the driver. Who? Could he talk to me? I glanced back up at the Moyenne and wondered how the driver could have survived the long fall and crash. The Wolf was supposed to be a tough guy. This tough?

I flashed my creds, and the police surrounding the wreck let me move on.

Then I could see. I knew who it was trapped in the wreck. I couldn't believe it, though. I just couldn't believe what I was seeing with my own eyes.

My heart was thumping loudly, racing out of control. So was my mind, what was left of it. I came up to the smoldering, overturned car. I knelt on the rocky ground and leaned forward.

"It's Alex," I said.

The car's driver looked at me and tried to focus. His body was trapped inside the crumpled Mercedes. He'd been crushed by metal everywhere below the shoulders. Just awful to see.

But Martin Lodge was alive, and he was hanging on. He seemed to want to say something, and I moved closer. "It's Alex," I said again. I turned my head so that my ear was near his mouth.

I needed to know the identity of the Wolf. I had so many questions.

Martin whispered, "It's all for nothing. Your manhunt is useless. I'm not the Wolf. I never even saw him."

Then he died on me, and everyone else who was waiting for an answer.

Chapter 112

The Lodge family had been taken into protective custody back in England. We all felt that if the Wolf suspected that the wife or any of the children had been told anything incriminating, they would be targets. Maybe he'd kill them just to be safe, or because he felt like killing somebody that day.

The next morning I flew to London and met with the police at Scotland Yard, specifically Lodge's superior, a man named John Mortenson. First, he reported that none of the survivors at Cap-Ferrat seemed to know anything about the Wolf, or even who Martin Lodge had been.

"There is a new development, a little wrinkle," he told me then.

I leaned back in a leather lounger with a view of Buckingham Palace. "At this point, I'm not surprised about anything, John. Tell me what's going on. This is about the Lodge family?"

He nodded, sighed, and then began. "It starts with Klára Lodge. Klára Cernohosska, actually. Let me begin with her. It turns out Martin was on the team that brought a defector named Edward Morozov out of Russia back in 'ninety-three. Martin worked with the American CIA, with Cahill and Hancock, and also Thomas Weir. Only there was no Edward Morozov. He was an unidentified KGB defector whose name we don't know. We think that it was the Wolf."

"You started by saying something about Martin's wife, Klára. What about her?"

"For one thing, she's not Czech. She came out of Russia with the man called Morozov. She was an assistant to a KGB chief, and also our main source of information in Moscow. She and Lodge apparently got cozy during the transfer, and then she was relocated to England. He had her identity changed, got rid of the records. Then he married her. How about that?"

"And she knows who the Wolf is, what he looks like? Is that it?"

"We don't know what Klára knows. She won't talk to us. She might talk to you, though."

I sat back, shook my head. "Why me? I met her only once."

Mortenson shrugged, then he gave a half smile. "She says her husband trusted you. You believe that? What the hell is that supposed to mean? Why would she trust you, if you met her only once?"

Unfortunately, I had no idea.

Chapter 113

What remained of the Lodge family was being kept under wraps in a small town called Shepton Mallet, which was about 120 miles west of London. Rolling valleys, lots of green countryside, perfect for hiding them, at least temporarily.

The Lodges were staying in a converted farmhouse on a "no through" road outside of town. The land was fairly flat there, and anything approaching could be seen for miles. Besides, this was an armed compound, heavily armed.

I arrived at about six that evening. The inside of the farmhouse was pleasant, with lots of antique furniture, but I had dinner with the family in a cramped bunker that was located belowground.

Klára didn't cook the meal as she had in London, and I wondered if she approved of the fare. I doubted it. The food was dreadful, worse than airplane fare. "No míchaná vejce on the menu," I finally tried as a joke for her.

"You remember our breakfast in Battersea, even the correct pronunciation. That's good, Alex," Klára said. "You're very observant. Martin said you were a good agent."

When the meal was over, the children-Hana, Daniela, Jozef-were sent to their room to do homework. Klára sat with me and smoked a cigarette. She took long puffs and inhaled deeply.

"Homework?" I asked. "Here? Tonight?"

"It's good to have discipline, habits to fall back on. I think it is. So you were with Martin? When he died?" she asked. "What did he say to you? Please tell me."

I considered my response. What did Klára want to hear? And what should I tell her?

"He said that he wasn't the Wolf. Is that true, Klára?"

"Anything else? What else did he tell you?"

I thought about telling Klára he'd talked about her and the children, but I didn't. I didn't want to lie to her. Probably I couldn't. "No, Klára. That's all it was. There wasn't much time. Only a few seconds. He didn't suffer too long. He didn't seem to be in pain. I think he was in shock."

She nodded. "Martin thought I could trust you. He said it was your flaw, actually. He would never say anything sentimental, not even with his dying breath."

I stared into Klára's deep brown eyes, which seemed surprisingly alert.

"How do you feel about that?" I asked.

She laughed. "It's why I loved him."

She had things to tell me that night in the English countryside. A negotiation was begun between the two of us. Or rather, I got to listen to her demands.

"I want safe passage out of England for myself and the children. New identities, and we get to keep some savings to live on. I'll tell you where we want to live, but not right now. That will come a little later."

"Prague?" I asked. It was a small joke.

"No, definitely not Prague, Alex. And not Russia, either. Or anywhere in America, for that matter. I'll tell you where, when the time comes. But first, let's decide on what I have to give you to guarantee our safe passage out of England."

"Oh, that's easy. You have to give us a lot," I said. "You have to give up the Wolf. But can you do that, Klára? What do you know? Who is he? Where is he? What did Martin tell you?"

Finally she smiled. "Oh, he told me everything. Martin adored me."

Chapter 114

The Wolf flew his own plane into Teterboro Airport in the northern corner of New Jersey. A black Range Rover was waiting there for him, and he took it into New York City, a city he'd always despised. The traffic was bad, as usual, and it took him as long to get from Teterboro to Manhattan as it had to fly to the metropolitan area from New Hampshire.

The doctor's office was situated in a brownstone on Sixty-third Street just off Fifth. The Wolf parked the Range Rover and hurried inside.

It was a little past nine in the morning. He didn't bother to check if he was being watched. He didn't think so, but if he was, there was nothing he could do about it now. Besides, he felt he had this morning sufficiently covered. As usual, there was a plan for every eventuality.

The nurse on duty for the plastic surgery was also there to act as a receptionist. She and the hotshot surgeon would be the only ones present for the procedures. He had insisted on a staff of two and that the office be closed to other patients for the day.

"There are a few legal forms for you to look over and sign," the nurse told him with a tight smile. She might not have known who he was, but she suspected there had to be a very good reason for this much secrecy, not to mention that she was being paid handsomely to work this shift.

"No, I will sign nothing, thank you," he said, then pushed past her and went looking for Dr. Levine. He found her in a small operating theater that was already brightly lit, and very cold.

"Reminds me of Siberia. A gulag I spent time in one winter," he said.

The doctor turned, and she was mildly attractive, slender, well preserved, probably in her early forties. He could fuck her, in a pinch, but he wasn't in the mood right then. Maybe later.

"Dr. Levine," he said, and shook hands with the surgeon. "I'm ready, and I don't want to be here more than a few hours. So let's begin. Now."

"That's not possible," Dr. Levine started to object.

The Wolf raised his hand to silence her, and it almost seemed as if he might actually strike the doctor. She flinched.

"I won't be needing general anesthesia. As I said, I'm ready. So are you."

"Sir, you have no idea what you're saying. None, I assure you. The procedures we have scheduled include a face, neck, and brow lift. Liposuction. Jaw and cheek implants. And a nose job. The pain will be unbearable. Trust me on that."

"No, it will be bearable. I've known much worse pain," said the Wolf. "I will allow you only to monitor my vital statistics. There will be no more stupid discussion about anesthesia. Now, get me ready for the procedures. Or else."

"Or else what?" Dr. Levine bristled. The small woman rocked back on her heels.

"Just or else," answered the Wolf. "That covers a great deal of territory, don't you think? It covers pain beyond what you believe I cannot endure. Can you, Dr. Levine? Can your two children, Martin and Amy, endure such pain? Or your husband, Jerrold? Let's begin. I have a schedule to keep."

Always a schedule.

And a plan.

Chapter 115

He never once screamed, never made a sound during any of the grueling procedures, and neither the surgeon nor the nurse could comprehend what they were witnessing. The patient seemed to have no feeling at all. As males often do, he bled a great deal during the operations, and there was already a lot of deep purple bruising on his face. The pain he endured during the hour-and-a-half rhinoplasty, or nose job, was the worst by far, especially when large chunks of bone and cartilage were removed without even a topical anesthetic.

At the conclusion of the rhinoplasty, the final procedure, he was told by Dr. Levine not to stand, but he did anyway.

His neck felt tight and tender, and there was Betadine all over his scalp and throat. "Not bad," he rasped. "I've experienced much worse."

"Do not blow your nose. For at least a week," the doctor insisted, seemingly trying to maintain her dignity and a tenuous sense of control.

The Wolf reached into his trousers and produced a handkerchief, but then put it back. "Just kidding," he said, then frowned. "Do you have any sense of humor, Doctor?"

"You can't drive, either," said the doctor. "That I will not allow. For the sake of others."

"No, of course not. I wouldn't think of it, putting others in jeopardy. I'll just leave my vehicle here on the street to be carjacked. Let me get your money. It's become boring to be here with you."

It was then, as he walked to fetch his briefcase, that the Russian staggered slightly-and also got the first look at himself in a mirror, his incredibly bruised and swollen face, at least what showed around the bandages.

"You do nice work," he said, and laughed.

He opened the briefcase and pulled out a Beretta with silencer. He shot the astonished nurse in the face, twice, then turned to Dr. Levine, who had hurt him so much.

"Any other things I should or shouldn't do?" he asked. "Any last bits of advice you wish to impart?"

"My children. Please don't kill me," the doctor begged. "You know I have children."

"They'll be better off without you. I think so, bitch. I bet they would agree."

He shot her through the heart. A mercy killing, he thought to himself, especially after the way she'd tortured him. Plus, he just didn't like her, the humorless bitch.

Finally, the Wolf left the office and walked to his Range Rover. He was thinking that no one knew what he looked like now. Not a single person anywhere.

And that got him laughing, almost uncontrollably. This was his piece of the puzzle.

Chapter 116

"There he is-has to be."

"He's laughing! What's so funny? Look at him. Can you believe it?"

"He looks like he was scalped, then had his skin flayed," Ned Mahoney said when the heavily bandaged man in a gray overcoat emerged from the brownstone. "He looks like a goddamn ghoul."

"Don't underestimate him," I reminded Ned. "And don't forget, he is a ghoul."

We were watching the Wolf-at least, the man we believed to be the Wolf-as he left a plastic surgeon's office on the East Side of Manhattan. We had just gotten there, less than sixty seconds before. Almost missed him again.

"Don't worry, I'm not underestimating him, Alex. That's why we have half a dozen teams getting ready to pounce on him. If we'd gotten here sooner, we could have grabbed him inside the doctor's office."

I nodded. "At least we're here. It was a complicated negotiation in England. Klára Lodge and her children are somewhere in northern Africa now. She did her part."

"So the Wolf has had a tracking device under his shoulder blade since he came out of Russia? That's the story?"

"We're here, aren't we? According to Klára, Martin Lodge knew where he was all along. That kept Lodge alive."

"We're ready to go, then? We take him?"

"We're ready. I'm ready." Jesus, was I ready. I wanted to take this bastard down so badly. I couldn't wait to see the look on his face.

Mahoney spoke into the mike attached to his headset. "Close on him now. And remember, he's extremely dangerous."

You got that right, Neddo.

Chapter 117

The black Range Rover was stopped at a light on the corner of Fifth Avenue and Fifty-ninth Street. Dark sedans pulled up on both sides. A third car blocked off the intersection. Agents jumped out of the cars. We had him!

Gunfire suddenly erupted from a white Hummer in front of the Range Rover. The doors of the Hummer flew open. Three men with automatic weapons came out firing.

"Where the hell did they come from?" Mahoney yelled into his mike. "Everybody down!"

We were already out of our car and running toward the gunfight. Ned fired and took down one of the Wolf's bodyguards. I hit another, and a third bodyguard opened up on us.

Meanwhile, the Wolf was out of the Range Rover and running down Fifth Avenue, staying out in the street with the cars. The condition of his face made him look as though he'd already been shot, or maybe badly burned in a fire. People on the sidewalk were hitting the pavement because of the gunshots coming from everywhere. Several were screaming uncontrollably. How far did the Wolf think he could get, looking the way he did? In New York City, maybe far!

More gunmen appeared, seemingly out of nowhere. More of his bodyguards. He had certainly brought backup. Had we brought enough?

And then the Wolf ducked into a store on Fifth. Mahoney and I followed him. I didn't even notice what store it was. Upscale. Glitzy. Fifth Avenue, for God's sake!

The Wolf did the unthinkable then. Although nothing he did completely surprised me anymore. His right arm shot forward and released a dark object into the air. I watched it start to tumble.

I shouted, "Grenade! Everybody down! Get down! Grenade!"

A powerful explosion at the front of the store blew out two massive picture windows. Shoppers were hurt. The smoke was very thick and dark. Everybody inside the store was screaming, including the clerks behind nearly every counter.

I never lost sight of the Wolf, never lost my focus on him. No matter what he did, no matter what the danger, he couldn't be allowed to get away this time. The cost was too high. This was the man who had held the world hostage. He'd already murdered thousands.

Mahoney ran down one aisle and I took another. The Wolf appeared to be headed for an exit onto a side street. I'd lost track of where we were. Fifty-fifth Street? Fifty-sixth?

"He doesn't get out!" Ned shouted over to me.

"You've got that right."

We were getting closer and I could see the Wolf's face. With all the bandages, the bruising and swelling, he looked fiercer than I could have imagined. Worse, he looked desperate, capable of anything. But we already knew that.

He yelled, "I'll kill everybody in the store!"

Neither Mahoney nor I answered; we just kept coming. But we didn't doubt what he'd said.

He grabbed a small blond girl away from what looked to be a nanny. "I'll kill her. I'll kill the little girl. She's dead! I'll kill her!"

We kept coming.

He held the toddler against his chest. His blood was dripping all over her. The girl was screaming, squirming wildly in his arms.

"I'll kill -"

Ned and I fired at almost the same time-two shots and the Wolf stumbled backward, letting go of the girl. She fell to the floor, then got up screeching and ran to safety.

So did the Wolf. Out the nearest side door and onto the street.

"He's wearing a vest-has to be."

"We'll shoot him in the head," I said.

Chapter 118

We chased him east on Fifty-fifth Street, along with a couple of our agents and two fleet-footed New York City policemen. If any of the Wolf's bodyguards had survived the bloody shoot-out on Fifth Avenue, they'd lost track of their boss in the shuffle inside the store. They were nowhere to be seen now.

Still, the Wolf looked as though he knew where he was going. Was that possible? How could he have planned for this? He probably couldn't have-so we'd get him now, right? I couldn't let myself believe otherwise-that all of this could come to nothing.

We had him in our sights. He was right there in front of us.

Suddenly he turned into a building, redbrick, eight to ten stories high. Did he know someone there? More backup? A trap? What?

There was security inside; at least, there had been. But the uniformed guard was dead now, shot in the head, lying facedown and bleeding on the glossy marble floor.

The elevators were all busy, red lights flashing the floors-eight, four, three-all going up.

"He's not getting out of here. That's settled," Mahoney said.

"We can't know that, Ned."

"He can't fucking fly, can he?"

"No, but who the hell knows what else he can do. He came in here for a reason."

Mahoney assigned agents to wait for all of the elevators, then to systematically check the floors from bottom to top. Reinforcements were on the way from the NYPD. There would be dozens of cops here soon. Then hundreds. The Wolf was in the building.

Mahoney and I took to the stairs in pursuit.

"Where do we go? How far?"

"The roof. It's the only other way out of here."

"You really think he's got a plan? How, Alex?"

I shook my head; I had no way of knowing. He was bleeding, had to be weak; maybe he was even delirious. Or maybe he had a plan. Hell, he'd always had a plan before.

So up we went, all the way. The top floor was nine, and we didn't see the Wolf as we peeked out of the stairwell. We quickly checked the offices; no one had seen him-and they sure would have remembered if they had.

"In the back. There's stairs up to the roof," someone told us in a law office.

Ned Mahoney and I climbed more stairs, then we stepped outside into bright daylight. We didn't see the Wolf. There was a single-story structure, like a small hat on top of the old building. Water tower? The super's office?

We tried the door; it was locked.

"He has to be here somewhere. Unless he jumped," Ned said.

Then we saw him coming around from behind the tower. "I didn't jump, Mr. Mahoney. And I thought I told you not to work on this case. I think I was clear. Put down your guns right now."

I stepped forward. "I brought him here."

"Of course you did. You're the indefatigable, don't-give-up, relentless Dr. Cross. That's why you're so predictable, and useful."

Suddenly a New York City policeman stepped out of the same trapdoor opening to the roof that we had used. He saw the Wolf and fired.

He hit the Wolf in the chest, but it didn't stop him. He was wearing a vest, had to be. The Russian growled like a bear and charged the cop, waving both arms over his head.

He grabbed the surprised officer and picked him up. There was nothing Ned or I could do. Next thing, he hurled the man off the roof.

The Wolf started to race toward the other side of the rooftop, and he seemed genuinely insane. What was he doing? Suddenly I thought I knew. The building to the south was close enough so that he was going to jump for it. Then, coming in from the west, I saw a helicopter. For him? Was that the escape plan? Don't let this be happening.

I ran after him. So did Mahoney. "Stop! Stop right there!"

He was running in crazy zigzags away from us. We fired but didn't hit him with the first shots.

Then the Wolf was airborne, both his arms flailing-and he was going to make it to the other rooftop with room to spare.

"You bastard, no!" Ned yelled. "No!"

I stopped running, aimed carefully, and squeezed the trigger four times.

Chapter 119

The Wolf kept pumping his legs and seemed almost to be running on thin air, but then he started to drop. His arms reached out toward the edge of the other building. His fingers reached for the roof.

Mahoney and I ran up to the edge of our building. Could the Wolf get out of this one? Somehow, he always found a way. Except this time-I knew I'd hit him in the throat. He had to be drowning in his own blood.

"Fall, you fuck!" Ned screamed at him.

"He's not going to make it," I said.

And he didn't. The Russian's body fell, and he didn't fight it, didn't make a sound, never screamed out. Not a sound came from him.

Mahoney yelled down at him. "Hey, Wolf! Hey, Wolfman! Go to hell!"

The fall looked as if it had been shot in slow motion, but then he hit the ground in the alleyway between the buildings. Hit it hard. I stared down at the Wolf's mangled body, the bandaged face, and I felt satisfied for the first time in a long while. I felt fulfilled and whole. We'd gotten him, and he deserved to die like that, squashed like a bug on the pavement.

Then Ned Mahoney started to clap and whoop and dance around like a complete madman. I didn't join in, but I knew what he was feeling. The man down there deserved this fate, if anyone ever did. Stone-cold dead in an alleyway.

"He didn't scream," I finally said. "Couldn't even give us that."

Mahoney shrugged his wide shoulders. "I don't care if he did or not. Here we are up here, there he is down with the garbage. Maybe there's some justice after all. Well, maybe not," Ned said, and laughed, putting his arm around me and squeezing.

"We won," I said to him. "Damnit, we finally won, Neddy."

Chapter 120

We won!

The next morning I flew back to Quantico in a Bell helicopter with Ned Mahoney and some of his stellar crew. They were celebrating the Wolf's demise at HRT over in Quantico, but I wanted to get home. I'd told Nana to keep the kids away from school because we were celebrating.

We won!

I let myself decompress for some of the car ride from Quantico to Washington. When I finally got to the house, when I could see it up ahead, I started to feel closer to normal, almost myself, or at least somebody I recognized. No one had come out onto the porch yet, so Nana and the kids hadn't seen me arrive. I decided to surprise them.

We won!

The front door wasn't locked, and I went inside. A few lights were on, but I didn't see anybody yet. Maybe they're going to surprise me?

Keeping very quiet, I made my way back to the kitchen. The lights were on-plates and silverware had been laid out for lunch-but nobody was there, either.

Kind of strange. Just a little bit off kilter. Rosie the cat came meowing from somewhere, rubbing up against me.

Finally I called out, "I'm home. Your daddy's home. Where is everybody? I'm home from the wars."

I hurried upstairs, but nobody was there. I checked for notes that might have been left for me. Nothing.

I ran downstairs. I looked out back, then up and down Fifth Street in front of the house. Not a soul in sight anywhere. Where were Nana and the kids? They knew I was coming.

I went back inside and made a few phone calls to places Nana and the kids might be. But Nana almost always left a note when she went out with the kids, even for an hour or so, and they'd been expecting me.

Suddenly I felt sick. I waited another half an hour before I contacted some people at the Hoover Building, starting with Tony Woods in the director's office. In the meantime, I'd looked around the house again, found no sign of any kind of disturbance.

A team of technical people arrived, and shortly afterward one of them approached me in the kitchen. "There are footprints out in the yard, probably male. Some dirt was recently tracked into the house. Could have been repairmen, or a delivery service, but it's definitely fresh."

That was all they found that afternoon, not another clue, not one.

Sampson and Billie came over in the evening, and we sat together and waited, at least for a call, something to go on, something to give me hope. But no call came, and sometime after two in the morning, Sampson finally went home. Billie had left about ten.

I stayed up all night-but nothing, no contact. No word at all about Nana and the kids. I talked to Jamilla on my cell phone, and it helped, but not enough. Nothing could have helped that night.

Finally, early in the morning, I stood at the front door bleary-eyed and stared up and down the street. It occurred to me that this had always been my worst fear, maybe everybody's worst fear, to be all alone, with nobody, and to have those you love the most in terrible danger.

We lost.

Chapter 121

The e-mail came on the fifth day. I almost couldn't bear to read it. I thought that I might throw up as I stared down at the words.

Alex, I read.

Surprise, dear boy.

I am actually not as cruel or heartless a person as you might think I am. The really cruel ones, the truly unreasonable ones, the ones we should all fear, are mostly in your own United States and in Western Europe. The money I have now will help stop them, help stop their greed. Do you believe that? You should. Why not? Why the hell not?

I thank you for what you did for me, and for Hana, Daniela, and Jozef. We owe you something, and I pay my debts. To me, "you are a gnat, but at least you are a gnat." Your family will be returned today, but now we're even. You will never see me again. I don't want to see you, either. If I do, you will die. That is a promise.

Klára Cernohosska,

Wolf

Chapter 122

I couldn't let it go, couldn't and wouldn't. The Wolf had invaded my house, taken my family, even though they had been returned unharmed. It could happen again.

Over the next few weeks I tested, then strained, the new cooperative relationship between the Bureau and the CIA. I got Ron Burns to put even more stress on the situation. I traveled out to CIA headquarters in Langley more than a dozen times, talked to everybody from junior analysts to the new director, James Dowd. I wanted to know about Thomas Weir and the KGB agent he'd helped bring out of Russia. I needed to know everything that they knew. Was that possible? I doubted it, but that didn't stop me from trying.

Then one day I was called up to Burns's office. When I arrived, I found Burns and the new CIA director waiting for me in his conference room. Something was up. This was going to be good-or very, very bad.

"Come on in, Alex," said Burns, cordial, as he often was. "We need to talk."

I stepped inside and sat across from the two heavies, both in shirttails, looking as if they had just come out of a long and difficult work session. About what? The Wolf? Something else that I didn't want to hear about?

"Director Dowd wants to say a few things to you," said Burns.

"I do, Alex," said Dowd, a New York lawyer who'd been an unexpected choice for CIA director. He had started in the New York Police Department, then gone into a lucrative private practice for several years. According to rumors, there were things that none of us knew, or wanted to know, about Dowd and his years in private practice.

"I'm just finding my way around out at Langley," he said, "and actually, this exercise has helped. We've spent a great deal of time and effort digging into everything about Director Weir."

Dowd looked over at Burns. "Just about all of it is good, an excellent record of service. But this kind of digging into old records isn't appreciated by some of the 'old warrior' types out in Virginia. Frankly, I don't give a shit what they think.

"A Russian by the name of Anton Christyakov was recruited and then brought out of Russia in 1990. This man was the Wolf. We're fairly sure about that. He was transported to England, where he met with a few agents, including Martin Lodge. Then he was moved to a house outside Washington. His identity was known only to a handful of people. Most of them are dead now, including Weir.

"Finally, he was moved to a city of his choosing-Paris, where he met up with his family: mother and father, wife, two young sons, ages nine and twelve.

"Alex, they lived two blocks from the Louvre, on one of the streets that was destroyed a few weeks ago. His entire family was killed there in 'ninety-four, but not Christyakov himself. We believe the attack may have been orchestrated by the Russian government. We don't know for certain. But somebody leaked where he was living to somebody who didn't want him to continue living. The attack may have taken place on the bridge across the Seine that was destroyed."

"He blamed the CIA and Tom Weir," Burns said. "And he blamed the governments that were involved. Maybe he went mad after that-who the hell knows. He joined the Mafiya and rose quickly. Here in America, probably in New York."

Burns stopped. Dowd didn't add anything more. They were both looking at me.

"So it's not Klára. What else do we know about Christyakov?"

Dowd raised his hands with both palms up. "There are notes in our records, but precious few. He was known by some Mafiya leaders, but they seem to be dead now, too. Maybe the current Mafiya 'big man' in Brooklyn knows something. There's another possible contact in Paris. We're working a couple of angles in Moscow."

I shook my head. "I don't care how long it takes. I want him. Tell me everything there is."

"He was close to his sons. Maybe that's why he spared your family, Alex," said Burns. "And mine."

"He spared my family to show how powerful he is, how superior to the rest of us."

"He squeezes a rubber ball," said Dowd, "A handball. Black."

I didn't follow at first. "I'm sorry, what?"

"One of his sons gave him a rubber handball before the boy died. A birthday present. In one of the notes we have, it says that Christyakov squeezes the ball when he gets angry. He's also said to favor beards. He's celibate now, according to the rumors, anyway. It's all pieces, Alex. That's what we have. I'm sorry."

So was I, but it didn't matter. I was going to get him.

He squeezes a rubber ball.

He favors beards.

His family was murdered.

Chapter 123

Six weeks later I traveled to New York, my fifth out-of-town trip in a row. Tolya Bykov had been at or near the top of the Red Mafiya gangs in New York, specifically the Brighton Beach area, for the past few years. He had been a Mafiya head in Moscow and was the most powerful leader to come to America. I was going to see him.

On a sunny, unseasonably warm day, Ned Mahoney and I made the journey out to Mill Neck on Long Island's Gold Coast. The area we drove through was heavily wooded, served by narrow roads, with no sidewalks anywhere.

We arrived at the Bykov compound with a dozen agents-unannounced. We had a warrant. There were bodyguards posted everywhere, and I wondered how Tolya Bykov could live like this. Maybe because he had to in order to remain alive.

The house itself was very large, a three-story Colonial. It had incredible water views across the sound all the way to Connecticut. There was a Gunite pool with a waterfall, a boathouse and dock. The wages of sin?

Bykov was waiting in his den for our talk. I was surprised at how tired, how old, he looked. He had small beady eyes in a pocked face rolling with fat. He was grossly overweight, probably close to three hundred pounds. His breathing was labored and he had a hacking cough.

I'd been told that he spoke no English.

"I want to know about the man called the Wolf," I said as I sat down across from him at a plain wooden table. One of our agents from the New York office translated, a young Russian American.

Tolya Bykov scratched the back of his neck, then shook his head back and forth, finally muttering several Russian words between a clenched jaw.

The translator listened, then looked at me. "He says you're wasting his time, and yours. Why don't you leave right now? He knows 'Peter and the Wolf,' no other. Wolves."

"We're not going to leave. The FBI, the CIA, we're going to be in Mr. Bykov's face, in his business, until we find the Wolf. Tell him that."

The agent spoke in Russian, and Bykov laughed in his face. The Russian said something, and the sentences mentioned Chris Rock.

"He says you're funnier than Chris Rock. He likes Chris Rock, political comedians in general."

I stood up, nodded to Bykov, then walked out of the room. I didn't expect too much more from the first meeting, just an introduction. I would be back, again and again if necessary. This was the only case I was working now. I was learning to be patient, very patient.

Chapter 124

Minutes later, I was leaving the large house, walking side by side with Ned Mahoney. We were laughing about the first interview-what the hell, might as well laugh.

I saw something, and did a double take- saw it again.

"Ned, Jesus. Look."

"What?" His head swiveled around, but he didn't see what I saw.

Then I was running ahead on legs that felt unsteady.

"What? Alex, what is it?" Ned yelled behind me. "Alex?"

"It's him!" I said.

My eyes were pinned on one of the bodyguard types at the compound. Black suit jacket and shirt, no overcoat. He was standing under a large evergreen, watching us watch him. My eyes dropped to his hand.

In the hand-a black ball, an old one. He was squeezing it, and I knew-I just knew-it had to be the handball given to the Wolf by his small son before he died. The man with the ball had a beard. His eyes looked at mine.

Then he started to run.

I yelled back at Ned. "That's him. He's the Wolf!"

I sprinted across the lawn, moving faster than I had in a while. I trusted that Ned was behind me.

I saw the Russian man jump into a bright red convertible; then he started it up. Oh no, God, no! I thought.

But I tumbled into the front seat before he put it into gear. I hit him with a short, powerful punch to the nose. Blood gushed all over his black shirt and jacket. I knew I'd broken his nose. I hit him again, square on the jaw.

I shoved open the driver-side door. He looked at me, and his eyes were coldly intelligent, like no eyes I'd ever seen, nothing so desolate. Inhuman. That was what the French president had called him.

Was he the real Tolya Bykov? It didn't matter to me now. He was the Wolf-I could see it in those eyes, the confidence, arrogance, but most of all, the hatred for me and everyone else.

"The ball," he said. "You knew about the ball. My son gave it to me. I congratulate you."

He gave a strange half smile, then bit down hard on something inside his mouth. I thought I knew what had happened. I tried desperately to force open his mouth. His jaw was clamped tightly shut, and suddenly the Russian's eyes were wide, incredibly big and full of pain. Poison. He'd bitten into poison.

Then his mouth opened and he roared full voice. White foam and spit ran over his lips and down his chin. He roared again, and his body began to convulse. I couldn't hold him down any longer. I pushed myself up, backed away from his flopping body.

He began to gag and to claw at his throat. The convulsing, the dying went on for several awful minutes, and there was nothing I could do and nothing I wanted to do, except watch.

And then it happened: the Wolf died in the front seat of the convertible, another of his expensive cars.

When it was over, I bent and picked up the rubber handball. I put it in my pocket. It was what killers I've caught call a trophy.

It was over and I was going home, wasn't I? I had things to think about, and so much to change about my life. I had the uncomfortable thought: I am taking trophies now, too.

But I had another, much more important thought: Damon, Jannie, Little Alex, Nana.

Home.

The Wolf is dead. I saw him die.

I kept telling myself that until I finally believed it.