Columbus (3 page)

“I would say ‘a rose by any other name’ but I’m sure you’ve heard that before.”

She smiles genuinely. “Only once or twice.”

The last fifteen years have taught me many things, but above all else is this: I cannot do what I do and maintain a relationship. There are no rules in the assassination world, no code, no honor amongst thieves. There are no civilians, no untouchable targets. If I continue to escalate this, if I continue to see Risina, then I have thrust her into this game despite the fact she will not know she’s playing. I have pounded my head against this immovable wall twice before. With Pooley, who died, and with a girl I loved, Jake Owens, whom I had to forcibly remove from my life. I thought I could go back to her, but I was wrong.

So what am I doing here? Jiri Dolezal is dead; my connection to the rare-book world has been severed. So why do I keep returning to that bookstore on the Via Poli, why am I still pretending to be a collector, why did I hire Risina to track down another
Compleat Angler
for me? Why did I suggest dinner tonight?

Is it because I’m searching for some vestige of humanity in myself and I’m willing to put another life in danger, if only to satisfy my basest instincts?

I’ll say it again. I told you not to like me.

CHAPTER TWO

THE MARK’S NAME IS ANTON NOEL.
He is the fifty-two-year-old chief information officer of a French pharmaceutical company based in Paris named Ventus-Safori. He has worked there for over two decades, rising through the ranks since he was hired out of school as an assistant accountant in the late eighties. The attached surveillance photos reveal a man who has not passed on too many crepes since graduation.

Ryan and I met outside a cathedral in Turin to exchange the file.

“It’s the same procurer as the Prague job.”

“That’s the fourth time they’ve hired me.”

“They like your work.”

“I met the fence. . . . ”

“Doriot.”

“Yes. I met him in Brussels before the first job when he wanted to take a look at me. He was hard to read.”

Ryan looked at me with a level expression. “Which means he’s a professional.”

“Yeah. I get that. He’s still the one handling affairs for this client, then?”

Ryan nodded.

“I don’t want to get too tied to one contractor. I mean, I think we should—”

My fence held up one palm as though nothing further needed to be said on the subject. “I understand. You still want this file then, or do you want me to beg off to Doriot?”

“No, I’ll take it.”

He handed it to me, and I felt that weight again. Heavier this time. The stones piling up.

Ryan stared hard at me. “You sure you’re ready, Columbus?”

“Of course.”

He looked like he had something more to say, but I avoided his eyes. Finally, we shook hands and left.

Now, with the file in my hand, I pore over its contents, an uneasy feeling prickling my brain.
Am
I ready? What did Ryan see in me that made him ask that question?

Noel appears to be a typical rich European businessman. He keeps a mistress in a small apartment on the Left Bank. He employs a couple of Serbian bodyguards, veterans from a mostly forgotten war. He travels a few times a month by private jet to London or New York or Geneva. Peculiarly, he drives his own car, a Mercedes, and has his bodyguards sit behind him and in the passenger seat. This piques my interest, the way Dolezal’s rare-book collection stood out on the page for me. If he’s chauffeuring his bodyguards around, then he isn’t particularly concerned with his own protection. Or he’s arrogant, controlling, a trait I’ve seen in some of these business titans. They don’t want to relinquish control of any part of their lives, even the mundane.

Possibilities emerge in front of me. Take him en route to work, while he’s behind the wheel? Take him at the private airfield housing his jet? Strike when he’s occupied with his mistress? Take that control he cherishes and turn it against him?

I should have left for Paris already. I am four weeks into an eight-week assignment and I should be following my mark, forming strike plans, identifying his weaknesses, searching for evil.

But I am with Risina, in her small apartment in Rome, keeping that weight off me, even if the relief is only temporary.

Her cooking is awful. The pasta is chewy, the sauce is bland, the cheese on top is strong enough to melt my nose, and I love every bite of it. A home-cooked anything is enticing for someone who barely knows the meaning of the word “home,” and if the wine has to flow to wash it down, so be it.

She looks at me across the table, her fork poised in midair.

“I seem to talk a great bit about myself, and when I leave you, I realize I’ve learned nothing new about you.”

“I find you interesting.”

She points the fork at me. “I know what you’re doing and it won’t work.”

“What am I doing?”

“I am going to ask you a direct question and you are going to turn it around back to me.”

“Ask.”

“Okay. I will ask this. What do you do for a living that brings you to Italia so often?”

“That’s an easy one. Why did you start working with book collectors?”

She laughs and wags her finger. “I told you.”

There are two parts to lying, and both require practice. One is to hold your eyes steady and to speak with only a hint of inflection. The second is to make the lie so plain and uninteresting as to rule out any follow-up questions.

I set my face. “My work is boring. I work for an airline company. I buy and sell parts for airplane wings. I line up contracts all over the world.”

“You see. That is not boring. You are an international businessman.”

“A boring international businessman.”

“But as you say, you travel all over the world.”

“Doing a job any man can do.”

“I think you are modest.”

“Just telling the truth.”

And the corners of her mouth turn up into a smile, this one stretching farther, because she is with a man who tells the truth, who is safe, who is humble about his life. The sadness below the surface has dissipated, at least a bit.

She takes a bite of her pasta and makes a face.

“My cooking is terrible.”

“No,” I say and keep my gaze locked. “I mean, I can’t feel my tongue any more, but it’s really wonderful.”

She erupts in laughter, the infectious kind, color coming to her cheeks.

“Okay, we’re going to try something only one time,” she says as she pushes her plate to the center of the table, dismissing it.

“What?”

“We’re going to ask each other one question and no topic is how-do-you-say. . . . ”

“Off limits?”

“Yes, taboo. Off limits. And the other has to answer truthfully, no matter what is asked. Maybe we’ll learn something and want to learn more, or maybe after hearing the answer, we’ll decide we just aren’t . . . we just don’t want to keep seeing each other.”

“Sounds dangerous.”

“Possibly.”

“Okay, I’m in.”

“Okay?”

I nod and she smiles.

“Can I ask first?”

I nod again.

“Why do you want to see me, Jack?”

I don’t have to set my face, don’t have to lie, not this time. “I want to know who put that sadness in your eyes, in your cheeks.”

She leans back, the answer catching her off guard, and folds her arms across her chest. For a long moment, she doesn’t say anything, and even the air in the room seems to still.

“Is that your question to me?”

“That’s my answer to your question. I haven’t asked one yet.”

She nods, forces a smile. Her voice stays low. “Okay, then, what is your question?”

“We don’t have to—”

“Don’t be silly. This was my idea.”

“Okay. Are you ready?”

She lowers her eyes like she’s bracing herself, and her nod is barely perceptible.

I wait until she looks up, then arrest her eyes with mine. “My question is this. What is the recipe for this pasta?”

She blinks, and then starts laughing again. It is a sound that will stay with me for the next few weeks, holding me afloat like a life preserver.

The signs are there, if you pay attention. Little things: you bang your shin into the coffee table in the morning, or you step off a curb into a puddle of sewer water, or you can’t find your wallet, your keys, your jacket, no matter how hard you look. Bad luck has a way of building momentum, of summoning its strength like an ocean wave before crashing down over you, knocking you off your feet. If you can spot the signs, you might be fortunate enough not to drown.

Paris is chilly and gray in February, though it is desperately trying to maintain its charm. There is something sad about it, like a hostess doing her best to keep a party together after the first guests start trickling away. Stores and restaurants are open, but outside tables are empty and silent. People shuffle by without talking, hurrying to get where they’re going, lighting cigarettes without breaking stride.

I have seen Anton Noel four times. Once, at a charity auction where I monitored him from a crowd inside an art gallery. Once, at a business conference where he droned on in French about the necessity of product diversification in emerging global markets. And twice, I have watched him driving his Mercedes, heading out of the gate where the Rue du St. Paul meets the Rue St. Antoine.

The gate is well guarded, with two dark-suited men perking up whenever the boss is about to roll outside, and a bevy of cameras pointing out at the street. I can watch the gate from the front window of a café a block away without drawing attention to myself . . . just order a coffee and a pastry while I pretend to read an American newspaper. The guards are a signal; they sit relaxed throughout most of the day, slumped in stiff chairs, even when a delivery truck or visitor crosses through the gates. However, when a white phone near the gate rings, they both rise to attention and stand erect, eyes sweeping the area, always five minutes before the black Mercedes drives out, Noel at the wheel, his bodyguards in the passenger seat and behind him.

Most often, it is this type of security I find myself up against: lax, poorly conceived, untrained. These guards—and the ones riding in the Mercedes—are simply window-dressing, as empty and impotent as a scarecrow in a field. They work as a deterrent against amateur thieves and muggers and kidnappers, but are worthless against a professional contract killer.

And herein lies the rub: it is my duty, my obligation, to keep my concentration at the highest level, to eliminate my prey flawlessly, even when faced with unworthy opposition. This is how I became what the Russians call a Silver Bear, an assassin who commands top fees because he never defaults on a job. I became one by never underestimating my mark, by treating every job as if it were my last.

“Your espresso.”

“
Merci
.”

The shop owner has shuffled over carrying a saucer and a small cup and I keep my face pleasant and unmemorable.

“This weather . . . pfff,” he says and I just want him to hand me my drink and move back to the counter. I’ve learned not to start up conversations, not to engage with Europeans who spot an English-speaker and want to practice the language. There is a way of holding my face still, of acting like I am deep in thought, concentrating on the paper, that makes waiters or shop owners leave the food behind and walk away without thinking further of it, without thinking “I should remember this asshole. I better keep an eye on him.”

My behavior is working, the man is already whispering
perdon
s as he sets down the saucer, is already taking one step backward, but he didn’t place the saucer carefully on the railing and the plate and cup topple over, spilling espresso all over my pants before crashing to the floor.

He starts cursing himself in French, all apologies and wishes for forgiveness and how could he be such an oaf, and I just tell him not to worry about it, it’s cool, don’t worry at all, but now others are looking at me in the shop and my anonymity is slightly compromised.

Bad luck. You can remain focused, hone your concentration, but you are powerless against luck when it sours and turns against you. I cannot allow it to build, so I am up and moving out the door, leaving five euros behind which should be enough to make him happy his error didn’t cost him my business.

I am going to kill Noel today. I am going to kill him on this street, when I see the guards receive the phone call and the black Mercedes pull out of the gate and turn in this direction, toward the end of the narrow lane. I am going to be seated on an old Honda motorcycle, idling on the left side of the road. When he drives past me I am going to shoot him in the face through his driver’s side window. The car will be moving when I shoot him, which will cause the vehicle to continue forward into a row of parked cars, so that by the time his bodyguards and any on-lookers realize what is happening, I will be ten blocks away.

I was planning on having five minutes after I hear the white phone ring to quietly pay for my drink and head out, still reading my newspaper, and then I would sit on top of the motorcycle, folding the paper back, appearing like I’m finishing an article while my right hand slips inside my jacket and finds my Glock. But now that plan has to be modified.

I can’t loiter at the end of the street, can’t draw any suspicion to myself. The time Noel leaves varies each afternoon; the only clue is the white phone ringing.

I should abort, should do this job tomorrow, but I hesitated too long in Rome, didn’t get started on my surveillance until the sixth week on this job and the contractor is expecting a dead body by the time the sun sets tonight. I have put all my eggs in the white phone basket. My two previous scouts proved it would be an effective strategy, a way to exploit his flawed sense of security.

I can’t go back to square one anyway; the café owner would remember me now. If I entered his shop tomorrow at the same time, he would have another reason to recognize my face and make contact and continue to apologize and my anonymity would be surrendered completely. It has to be today.