Overfall

Thirty-four

They flew at Mach. 9 in the Gulfstream planning a nonstop to Victoria, BC, where they were to meet Grady. Anna made it a point to sit beside Jason on a couch as they began the trip. By the time they took off, the pepper spray had largely worn off, although she found herself a little red-eyed and blinking.

Sam had given Anna the blue oil and she rubbed it into Jason’s back. He became unusually relaxed. Anna hoped they could make the oil last until they got to Nutka, who had a small supply. After that it would be a serious issue.

She put her arm around Jason and hugged him mercilessly while Sam watched and chuckled. Anna finally got a chance to lay out her apology to Jason. Sam noticed that she didn’t leave out any details and took more than her share of responsibility. Jason listened but said little until she was finished.

“Sis, you know when I make a bad equation, I spend my time trying to get it right. That’s what you’ve done. You’ve got it right so the way I see it, the old equation is outdated, lost in the dustbin of history.”

Anna had gotten her lip gloss on, and was now planting butterfly circles all over Jason’s right cheek.

“Most of the men in this country would just love what you’re getting, Jason.”

“She’s my sister.” Jason smiled. “She’s pretty but she’s my sister.”

Anna felt ebullient.

“I suppose the morons want me back,” Jason said.

“I would like to fight for you, Jason. Maybe get rid of a guardian of your person altogether or get me appointed. How would you feel about that?”

“No more Mr. Roberto? That would be grand. I think he’s gone over to the Nannites.”

“We’re going to meet Grady. She’s going with us,” Anna said.

Jason thought for a minute.

“I’m worried,” he said. “I’m afraid she won’t think well of me because I haven’t seen her.”

“I’m nervous too, partner. I haven’t been her favorite. I saw her at Sam’s office but we haven’t really talked yet. She’s in love with Sam.”

“I know you will do great with Grady,” Sam said. “Anna will too, but you know they both are a lot alike, which makes it interesting.”

“Well, if we’re so much alike, how come she never argues with you?” Anna said.

“Oh, she did.” Sam smirked a little. “Now are you going to ask how come you continue to argue with me?”

“No, I don’t think I’ll ask that.”

After a time Jason went to sleep and Anna looked at Sam. “What?” he said when she continued looking.

“I’m sleepy.”

There was another couch. Without a word Sam found a pillow and put it in his lap. Anna lay down, put her head on the pillow and her hand in his. Soon Sam leaned back in the corner of the couch and fell asleep.

Although Jill had accompanied Grady to Victoria, the plan was for Jill to return to Sam’s office in LA. They were staying at the Empress Hotel under alias names because they were uncertain about when the Gulfstream would arrive. Sam had them remain at the hotel preferring to meet them there with the crowds, and the activity.

As they unloaded into several cabs at the Victoria Airport, Jason appeared nervous. Anna knew that it was too soon for the oil to wear off.

“Relax. She’s your daughter. The second you tell her that you love her and that you’ve been sick, she’ll start to respond. I promise.”

After they were in the cabs Sam leaned over to Anna. “You look as nervous as Jason.”

“Grady and I never really talked. You know she’s dead set on pleasing you so she just smiled grimly at me.”

“Relax,” Sam said. “You just lived through Devan Gaudet. How bad can this be?”

They called the Empress and told them to be on the boardwalk along the waterfront across the street from the hotel. They drove along the harbor and found Grady and Jill easily.

Anna decided to move decisively and end the drama. Without waiting she jumped out of the van and hugged a startled Grady.

“I’ve made some huge mistakes with your father. And as to you, I’ve been a know-it-all overbearing aunt. I’m sorry and I want to start over.”

Grady barely hesitated. “You’re fine. I’ve been jealous because you had a perfect family, a fabulous career, and my family has been screwed up and my life a mess. I hated you for it. Ah, you also like to fix things.”

“Yeah. I’m a real control freak. Maybe you and I can make it. You can fix me for a while. Your dad and I have made a start. I want to make a start with you.”

Grady stood looking in her eyes for the longest time.

“I’ll try,” she said. “Let’s go.”

Jason was in one of the cabs with the bodyguards, sitting beside Yodo, who now understood that he was to guard Jason at all costs. Grady got into another cab with Anna and Sam. Jill took her leave and grabbed a taxi for the airport.

“We have one more passenger,” Sam said.

Anna looked at him, curious. “This group needs a shrink.”

They drove a short distance to the Museum of Natural History, where they found Spring waiting out front. She loved museums, especially those filled with Native American exhibits.

They took vans to Sydney and awaited the ferry to Galliano Island.

“Would you like to meet your father?” Anna asked.

“At a ferry?” Then quite predictably for Anna, Grady looked at Sam.

“It’s forty minutes until the ferry. How about if Grady and I take a walk over there by the water? Anna can get Jason from the car behind. I can tell you that you will also get Yodo.”

“I don’t want to be a wuss but I’m nervous,” Grady said.

“Come on,” Sam said. Grady bounded out of the car and went with Sam. Anna went for Jason, who seemed to have taken to Yodo, who now followed him around like a towering shadow.

The wind was blowing and there was a chill. Whitecaps dotted the water, gulls circled, and bundled-up fishermen watched their rods and played in their plastic buckets, no doubt trying to figure how to make their bait look intriguing to a codfish.

“She’s waited a long time to talk with you, Jason,” Anna began. “So she’ll be a little nervous and a little excited all at the same time.”

“Since I’m normally nervous, this feels pretty usual.” He gave her his twinkling smile. When they walked up to the rail along the beach, Sam and Grady were facing the bay. Jason came up and stood beside Grady, who turned when he arrived. They stood apart for a second. Grady threw her arms around him.

Anna watched Grady’s face and knew it would work out.

Sam and Anna walked back to the car, not looking back.

“So far that was easy,” Anna said.

“All the ingredients were there. You just had to shake and stir.”

When they arrived at Galliano, they were picked up in a car borrowed by the crew of the Inevitable and taken across the island to Montague Harbor. It took three trips in the car to move all the people and luggage.

Normally bustling in the summer, Montague Harbor was completely abandoned now with not a single yacht at anchor. The small store and resort on the bay was closed up and the place was entrusted to a caretaker until spring.

Across the channel the small town of Ganges on Saltspring Island was likewise buttoned up for the winter, the moorings and docks largely pulled in for the southerly storms. As on Galliano, only the year-round island residents were about and street traffic was light, coffee shops were opening late and closing early. The ice cream parlor sat forlorn in its solitude.

The caretaker at Montague Harbor, a young man with ponytailed hair, lived in Ganges and most nights commuted by boat across the channel. He had a pregnant bride at home. He stood on the dock watching until T.J. engaged him in conversation, leading him off from the group. Sam came over after a minute, looked at the young man, and smiled.

“Everybody is curious about Inevitable. What would you like to know?”

“Where are you going?”

“Up north. All the way to the tip of Vancouver Island, up the Inside Passage. We’re just the crew and maintenance people, but we brought a bunch of friends along for the ride. In the winter the owner gives us a free trip. This time it’s kind of a bachelor party.”

The young man had plenty of questions about the boat, its range, horsepower, and cruising speed.

Perfect.

Anna stood to the side just to be safe. With her stocking cap, glasses, and platinum-blond hair, there wasn’t much chance that she would be recognized.

“What is it doing here?” Anna asked, glancing toward the giant yacht at anchor in the harbor.

“The owner is a friend; he’s letting us use it until we can make other arrangements. I figure in a couple weeks we will have found something more permanent for Jason. Something with a bomb shelter. So to answer your question, the boat is here waiting for us.”

When they pulled away from the dock, they could barely see the yacht in the gray drizzle and mist that hung like wet flannel, dampening sound and creating an eerie indistinctness that made one yearn for the warmth and definition of an open-hearth fire.

“Nice boat,” Anna said when she stepped off the large gangplank. “Where’s our room?” She looked weary. “We’ve been traveling for twenty-four hours.”

“It was a tortured route, but then nobody knows we’re here.”

“The last time I was on a boat it met with a sad ending. Isn’t this a sitting duck?”

“In this weather it’s nearly invisible. Of course we could try a Vancouver police station with our story and see how it goes.”

“I just thought maybe a house with a large grounds.”

“This moves constantly and in this weather is nearly impossible to find, unless you knew exactly where to look.”

“I’m not entirely convinced, but you’ve managed to keep us alive so far.”

By the time Sam showed her the owner’s stateroom and living space just behind the bridge, the weather had closed in so thoroughly that no land was visible even though they were less than a half mile from shore. The crew had weighed anchor and they were inching slowly forward out the narrow mouth of the harbor.

Sam took her to the bridge that by itself was worth a million dollars in electronics. They turned south, edged across the channel, and stopped midway, still completely fog-bound.

“What’s happening?” Anna asked.

“We’re getting off,” Sam said.

“But we just got on.”

“Surprising, isn’t it?”

“That’s why you told me to leave the bags on the deck.”

In minutes Sam, Anna, Grady, Spring, T.J., Yodo, Sanford, and an anxiety-ridden Jason got into a Zodiac inflatable speedboat and quietly motored off into the fog.

“I’m not believing this,” Anna said above the whispering motor.

“No one else will either. And that’s the point.” Sam said. “If anybody figured out that we went to Galliano, they will eventually find the dock boy. And what’s he going to tell them?”

“We went north. To Alaska. A bachelor party.”

“And when they learn about the yacht they’ll figure we can tick off over three hundred nautical miles every twenty-four hours-easily. Leaves a search area that’s utterly massive. We could have gone out the straits of Jaun de Fuca and down the coast to California, we could have gone to the west side of Vancouver Island, or Puget Sound and Seattle. Or as I said, we could head all the way to Alaska.”

“Where will the Inevitable go?”

“First to Vancouver, where three women and two men will leave the boat and board a private jet for Europe. They will land in London, leave the plane, and disappear. The yacht will sail on.”

“And go where?”

“Wherever they want as long as they keep moving. Those guys get a free winter cruise. But they will act exactly as if we were on board and they were protecting us. When they go into a harbor the men will watch the boat from the shore.”

“So all the guards went that way?”

“Uh-huh. All those guards did. We have others.”

“And was I the last person to find out what’s going on?”

“Oh, no. The crew and all those men were planning for us to be on the yacht. They had no idea we were getting off.”

“When did you tell them?”

“I told only T.J.”

“God, you are paranoid. What is this costing?”

“I’ve learned through hard, sad experience that a ruse works better if everyone involved actually believes it. People act according to their expectations. I pulled in some chits to rent the place we’re going for less than two hundred thousand dollars. A bargain for a woman worth two hundred fifty million.”

They traveled through the fog and mist to a long, slender harbor at the very end of the bay. There a passenger van waited, cloaked in the night, its engine running and lights off.

Anna knew only that they were winding up the side of a mountain, the headlights flashing on the green of trees, grasses, and ferns, a few aluminum mailboxes on white wood posts, grass a foot tall clumped at the bases. There were no streetlights and, after a time, no houselights, only the black illuminated to gray, and then it became so thick that they crawled up the road clinging to the center strip. Billions of tiny droplets grabbed headlight beams and spread them to a halo of rainbows-the result of driving in a cloud.

Finally, after going higher on an island than Anna would have thought possible, they came to a wide drive with beautiful iron gates. The driver pushed a button and the gates trundled on steel wheels.

Devan Gaudet’s mind was like a free-flowing river finding its way down a familiar canyon. Within ten minutes of leaving Taveuni, using a cell phone shipped out of the U.K., he was talking to his travel agent in Geneva. Fifty minutes after his arrival at Nadi Airport, he was on a jet to Sydney, Australia. Given years of discipline, he was able to sleep the entire flight. Upon his arrival in Sydney he went to work. First he would get control.

In a safe house in Sydney established the week prior, Benoit had seen to it that the GE phone costing about $50 was replaced by a scrambler phone built by Grace technicians at a cost of about $150,000.

“I’m afraid that moron, your boyfriend, will screw up our lives,” Gaudet began when he got her on the line. He liked to bring up that she had sex with Chellis, hoping that if he rubbed it in, her hatred for the man would continue to grow. “We need to move up the timetable. Doing nothing is not an option. We’ve got to move fast and hard or we’re going to lose this. Chellis will get too aggressive or talkative, so it’s time to proceed as I have laid out. You’d better call your friend Jacques.”

“Okay,” she said, exhaling a bit too long.

“Did you send a man to Grady’s apartment?”

“Of course.”

“And?”

“She had a cat.”

“So?”

“She boards it when she’s gone. A place called the Critter Sitter. She also has a computer. We’ve got the password and total access. Our guys have also broken into the Critter Sitter’s computer and written a program to divert any incoming mail from Grady. We will get it instead, and she’ll think she’s talking to the Sitter. We’re hoping she’ll use her e-mail account from the road to check on her cat.”

“Long shot,” Gaudet said. “Sam wouldn’t let anyone use a local computer to send anything. She would have to break the rules, and I wouldn’t count on that. It nearly killed her the last time. I’ve got another way. They need Nutka and the oil. She had a supply. I’m working with Samir. Some strangers came for Nutka in the night and I’m sure it was the Sam group. But we were faster, we have a radio transmitter in her bag, and more important, Samir has men in a cabin with her family. If she doesn’t tell us where they take her, Samir makes AK-47 stew. And I have other means.”

“Samir would do that?”

There was a quiet that made Gaudet smile and the quiet spoke more than words. Even with their love-making, she didn’t trust him.

“I didn’t know you talked with Samir,” she continued.

“Did I forget to mention that?”

“You’re an aloof bastard.”

“Don’t you suppose that’s how it is with most people who kill others for a living? The real standout here would be the personal assistant who screws everybody for a living.”

“You’re talking your way out of my bed.” The ice over the line pleased him. He liked sex with the rebellious ones.

“A woman of great poise can take a small joke.”

“Soon you’ll be no fun.”

“I will make it up to you.” It galled him to say it, but he wanted this woman. Apparently there were lines that he could not cross. Maybe in the end killing her would provide his only complete satisfaction.

“You mentioned other means of finding them.”

“Nothing is certain. It is, shall we say, a real coup d’etat? Something that is working out very well. You can trust me. We needn’t go into it.”

Samir Aziz paced in the waiting room of the laboratory, ignoring the magazines, Le Monde, and the receptionist. It seemed small and chintzy for such a prestigious lab. It irritated him that these people, on whom he had pinned his hopes, had cheap furniture and cheap paintings.

Michelle sat on a chair and clasped his hand as needed. He was extremely anxious to know what was in the oil, why it worked, and whether it could be duplicated. He was not sure that he could stand to live without it in the shadow of an anxiety so powerful that it sapped all satisfaction from his life.

At last the door to the working portion of the lab opened and Monsieur Dupre entered and offered a firm handshake.

“I’m afraid we still can’t tell you much. There are organics. Complex molecules that are very hard to figure without a clue. There is nothing that would affect your state of mind by itself, so it must be working in combination with something else, and right now neither the lab nor your neurologist can imagine what that might be. Maybe they have genetically altered your brain, but we have no details. We don’t know how they would do that. The note is not enough. It could be anything. In that oil there is every herbal remedy known to man. There are trace molecules. It’s a stew. Eventually we’ll get it if we don’t run out of material.”

“So you will keep looking.”

“Oh, yes. But it would be helpful if you could talk with the manufacturer of the oil.”

“Yes,” Samir said.

“What are we going to do?” Michelle asked on the way out the door.

“My men have taken your son. That is a first step.”

Obviously shocked, she threw her arms around him in the parking lot. It was the desired reaction.

“When, where is he?”

“On his way to Lebanon. It was a bitch getting him into the country without a passport. But in three hours when we arrive back in my country he will be at your apartment in Beirut. I wanted to surprise you.”

“How did you do it?”

“By promising them I would deliver some software that Chellis won’t. The software will be no more difficult to obtain than the oil recipe. I had to get your son because Chellis and company are apt to suppose that you have turned on them.”

“You are not the man I thought you were,” she said. “Not at all.”

“No, I am that man. But you could say that I am adapting to your kindnesses. Or maybe that where you are concerned I envy all other men their power, and so I have moved to diminish it in order to enhance my own.”

“It is necessary for you to portray yourself so harshly?”

Samir’s cell phone rang.

“Yes?” he said, expecting one of his men.

“This is your new friend.”

“What new friend?”

“You know what new friend. The friend that will have the recipe to the oil and all you need of it for the rest of your life. And not the crap you’ve been getting, but good stuff that will get you back to normal. I know exactly what’s going on, and soon I will control Grace Technologies and all that it possesses.”

Samir hung up stunned, knowing that Gaudet would not be lying. Gaudet’s power was growing. Immediately he dialed the number of Chellis’s offices. When advised Chellis was out, he put one of his men on to getting hold of him.

Gaudet was a predator, and Samir had a growing feeling that he might be on the menu.