The Equalizer (63 page)

But McCall did.

*   *   *

McCall left the airport and checked into the St. Regis Hotel on Sixteenth and K Streets. Then he took the metro to Friendship Heights and met her at Clyde's Restaurant near American University. Racing cars hung from the ceiling and raced along the walls. The lower restaurant was jammed with AU students. It was a fun place. McCall liked it.

She was sitting up at the end of the bar. He slid onto the stool beside her. He always thought she looked like that British actress Melissa George, if Melissa George had wanted to look like a 1940s movie librarian. She wore a man's white shirt, a long skirt, a single half-moon silver necklace at her throat. Her glasses reminded McCall of Mary's from Brahms's store, except they were not as expensive and tinted amber. Her blond hair was swept back into a ponytail. On the bar was a padded envelope that she kept one hand on while she drank a frosted glass of Samuel Adams with the other.

McCall said, “Hello, Moneypenny.”

“Don't call me that,” Emma Marshall said. “It gets my knickers in a twist. You look like shit.”

“Nice to see you again, too.”

“I brought what you requested,” Control's executive assistant said. She lowered her voice, although the ambience inside the restaurant was noisy. “Right out of the great man's safe. If he finds out I've done this, I'll be on the next plane home to Hackney East.”

“Would that be a bad thing?”

“Have you ever been to Hackney East in London?”

“No.”

“It would not be a good thing.”

She slid the envelope over to him.

“Who are you going to kill?” she asked, conversationally.

“No one.”

“You could go to a safe house here in D.C. and get all the firepower you need.”

“Then I'd be back. And I'm not coming back.”

“He wants you to. He misses you. He'd never admit it, but he does.” McCall didn't respond. “He'll be back from Prague in four days.” Emma tapped the envelope. “This has to be back in his safe before then.”

McCall nodded. “I also need your iPad.”

“Now you're going too far.”

But she fished into a copious green Kipling tote festival bag and came out with her iPad, which she also slid across the bar to him. The bartender came over.

“Glenfiddich,” Emma said automatically.

The bartender went away.

“I was very sorry to hear about Elena Petrov,” she said. “I know you two were close.”

“She's at rest now.”

“Is she? Why's that?”

McCall didn't elaborate. Emma regarded him with frank appraisal.

“There was an incident at the Summit Conference in Prague. You won't hear about it on the news. A sniper was apprehended on the grounds of the chateau before he could fire a shot. Maybe the president was his target, maybe someone else. When I say ‘apprehended,' I mean he was found with a knife sticking out of his forehead. Where did you just fly in from?”

“Vacation,” McCall said. “I'll call you.”

The bartender came back with the Scotch. McCall got off the bar stool. Emma took the Glenfiddich.

“I'll drink it,” she said. “It'll wash down the anaemic taste of your American beer. You could always give me a hug good-bye.”

“My ribs hurt.”

“I'll be gentle.”

McCall gave her a hug.

Both of them were gentle.

“If you're hurt, you'd better shoot straight,” Emma murmured.

“Thanks for this,” McCall said.

He walked away from her carrying the envelope and the iPad.

To find Jeff Carlson.

 

CHAPTER 44

McCall sat in a corner of the St. Regis Hotel bar with Emma's iPad and illegally tapped into the records of all of the Washington, D.C., car rental companies. It took him forty minutes to find out that Jeff Carlson had rented a blue Hyundai Accent a week before. He had given a local address as the Georgetown Inn on Wisconsin Avenue, NW.

McCall rented a black Kia Rio from Hertz through the hotel. They delivered it by 8:00
P.M
. McCall put the rental car on Christian Hyvonen's credit card, just like he had the flight from Prague and the hotel. The credit card account was good for another year before The Company would cancel it. They might need the bogus identity for another agent.

McCall drove to the Georgetown Inn. He cruised through the parking lot until he found Carlson's blue Hyundai parked in one of the back slots. He pulled into an empty space a dozen slots away and waited.

Carlson walked out of the Georgetown Inn at 9:00
P.M
. He didn't walk to his rental car. He strolled down Wisconsin Avenue. McCall followed him on foot. Carlson didn't once look back. He arrived at the Blues Alley jazz supper club on Wisconsin and was shown to a table. The place was cramped and boisterous, with small tables, but the ambiance was terrific. There was a traditional jazz group up on the raised stage called The Midnight Follies, whom McCall had never heard of, but they were good. The bearded pianist, whose name, he saw from the program on each table, was Keith Nichols, was the best jazz piano player McCall had ever heard. His hands flew over the piano keys like a blur.

McCall took a seat at the back. Carlson ordered the Nancy Wilson Barbecue Chicken Creole. McCall ordered the Tony Bennett Shrimp and Artichoke Hearts. Both of them listened to great traditional jazz and never once made eye contact. McCall followed Carlson back to the Georgetown Inn and settled into the driver's seat of the Kia and waited to see if he would come out again.

He didn't.

McCall waited another two nights. Both times Carlson went to the Blues Alley for supper. The first night McCall did also. The second night he let Carlson eat on his own, and just waited for him to return to the Georgetown Inn from behind the wheel of his rented Kia. Carlson strolled back and went into the hotel. But tonight he came back out again at about 11:00
P.M
. He had changed clothes and was dressed in black. He had on a backpack. He got into the Hyundai Accent and pulled out of the slot.

McCall followed him in the Kia.

Carlson drove through Georgetown and into Rock Creek Park. McCall stayed six car lengths behind him. A rust-red sign greeted them with:
WELCOME TO ROCK CREEK PARK—NATIONAL PARK SERVICE—U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR.
Carlson drove onto Rock Creek Parkway. McCall had to drop back even farther as the traffic in the park was light. They drove past the National Zoological Park. Then Carlson took a route that wound down to Grant Road NW. He pulled over into a small parking lot for six cars. McCall pulled up on the side of the road and waited. Carlson got out, locked the Hyundai, and hiked into the woods. McCall pulled the Kia into the spot next to the Hyundai. He took the envelope that Emma had given him out of the glove compartment and opened it. He took out a Glock 17 9 mm pistol with fixed sights, a 4.49-inch barrel, weighing twenty-two ounces. It had a full magazine, 17
+
1. McCall took an AAC Evolution 9 mm Suppressor from the envelope and twisted the silencer onto the end of the Glock. He put the gun with its silencer into the pocket of his coat, then got out of the Kia fast.

Carlson jogged through the trees. McCall caught up and stayed a hundred yards behind him. Tonight Carlson was jumpier. He looked over his shoulder several times, but he never saw McCall. The moon was out and bathed the park with pale radiance. Carlson was on the lookout for police cars. McCall was certain that a police presence in the park had been very much stepped up, but neither of them saw any police vehicles on the roads they transversed.

Carlson was taking a circuitous route that he had obviously memorized by heart. He ran across the bridge spanning a small rushing river that swept over myriad large stones and boulders. McCall waited until he'd reached the other side, then ran over the bridge after him. At the end of it McCall paused. For a moment he'd lost his quarry. Then he saw Carlson's figure running through the dark trees to his right.

McCall again kept at least a hundred yards behind him. The young man came to a stop in a heavily wooded area on the edge of a ribbon of moonlit road. He shrugged off his backpack and took something from it. Moonlight flared along a knife blade. He waited. McCall knelt beside a tree and brought out the Glock with its silencer. He held it in his right hand, resting the hand on his knee.

He waited.

Six minutes later a young woman came jogging down the road. She had long brunette hair piled up on her head, held together with a large plastic clasp. She was in her early twenties, wearing an American University sweatshirt and gray running shorts. She had on Nike Women Air Pegasus running shoes in gray with green laces and a maroon Nike swoosh. She was keeping up a good pace, regulating her breathing, looking straight ahead.

Carlson came out of the darkness of the trees so suddenly the girl barely had time to react. He grabbed her shoulder with his left hand and kneed her in the stomach. She gasped and fell to the ground. In his right hand Carlson had a Japanese Ginsu Hanaita Damascus steak knife. He pulled off the jogger's plastic clasp. Her hair tumbled around her shoulders. He dragged her into the bushes by her hair.

McCall ran forward to get into a better position. He saw Carlson throw the student to the ground. She tried to get up. He punched her in the mouth. Blood spit out between her teeth. She fell back. He put a knee onto her chest and the point of the Ginsu knife against her throat. He said something to her that McCall couldn't hear.

She stopped struggling, not that she had much choice with his knee crushing the air out of her lungs. She looked from the knife blade at her throat up into Carlson's face. Carlson was smiling. He undid the belt of his jeans, then unzipped them. She tried to heave him off her, but he was too strong. He pressed the knife point harder against her throat. A trickle of blood ran down from it. She stayed still.

She was terrified.

Carlson said something more to her. She stared up at him, still gasping breath into her constricted lungs. She shook her head. He moved the knife point from her throat to just below her left eye. He spoke softly to her. The smile was gone. McCall didn't need to hear the words to know what he said:
Do what I tell you or I'll cut your eye out.

He took his knee off her chest and knelt at her side, the knife still below her left eye.

She pulled down her running shorts and her panties.

Carlson climbed on top of her, maneuvering himself to enter her.

McCall took careful aim with the Glock and shot him in the right thigh. The
phht
of the gunshot couldn't have been heard ten feet away. Blood spurted from Carlson's leg. He grabbed at it, losing his balance and rolling off the girl. The knife fell to the ground as he grabbed his leg with both hands.

The jogger rolled away, pulling up her panties and running shorts as she got to her feet. It looked like she was going to bolt. Then she turned back and looked down at Carlson who was writhing in agony on the ground, clutching his right thigh. The steak knife was inches away from his right hand.

Kick the knife out of his reach!
McCall thought.

The girl stayed motionless, still gasping air into her lungs, staring down at her attacker.

Take out your cell phone!
McCall shouted at her in his head.
Call 911!

But she didn't do that.

The student reached down and picked up the Ginsu Hanaita Damascus steak knife from the ground.

Carlson looked up at her.

She fell to her knees and stabbed her would-be rapist eight times in the stomach and chest.

McCall was stunned.

Carlson's body went into convulsions, then it stopped moving.

The jogger straightened and dropped the bloodied steak knife beside her attacker's body. She regulated her breathing. Then she took her cell phone out of the back pocket of her running shorts and calmly dialed 911.

McCall knew there must be at least four patrol cars in Rock Creek Park, all waiting for a call like this. He was pretty sure Carlson was dead, but he didn't want to take the chance that she'd missed his heart.

He waited.

A white cop car with the red stripes on it, flashing lights, no siren, drove fast down the road behind the girl. Another radio car came from the other direction, red lights turning. Both cars converged on the student and uniformed cops jumped out of them.

Time for McCall to leave.

He untwisted the silencer and dropped it into his pocket along with the Glock 17.

Then he disappeared through the trees, ran across the bridge over the fast-flowing river, and made his way back to the small parking area where he'd left the rented Kia. He slid into the driver's side, returned the Glock 17 and the suppressor to the padded envelope, and put the envelope back into the glove compartment.

A third police car passed him, lights turning, siren on.

McCall drove back to the St. Regis Hotel. He could not get the picture out of his mind of the student kneeling beside Carlson and stabbing him. Once or twice, okay, but eight times seemed a little excessive to McCall.

But if you want a job done right …

All she had needed to do was step away from him and call 911. There was no way Carlson could have got to his feet and attacked her again. If McCall had wanted the rapist dead, he'd have shot him in the head. As it was, the police would be looking for an accomplice. Who else could have shot him in the leg? Maybe an accomplice who had got cold feet or a sudden attack of conscience.

McCall had made a mistake with Carlson. He should have killed him when he'd had the chance, not allowed him to go on and rape other young women. McCall hadn't thought it was up to him to make that judgment call. He had only been protecting Karen Armstrong, someone he knew, and not even that well. But he should have taken care of business. Now this AU student would have to live with the fact that she'd killed a man for the rest of her life.