The History Thief: Ten Days Lost (The Sterling Novels) (48 page)

“What the hell are you talking about?” York knew that playing stupid probably wouldn’t work, but it was all that he could muster. “I don’t have any map or USB!”

Charney thrust the pistol forward. “I am not going to repeat myself, monsieur!”

Shit!
York dropped his weapon and reached into his jacket, doing as he was told. He patted the pocket that held the book of maps he had used in Afghanistan. He reached into his pocket but extracted only the USB device.

He was stalling.

Slowly, he leaned lower and then slid it over to Charney.

With his pistol still trained on the young Green Beret, Charney knelt to the floor and retrieved the USB device.

His mission was not yet accomplished. He rose to his feet and smiled at York, “And now the book, if you please. My patience is finite and near its end.”

York didn’t move.

Charney wrapped his second hand around the grip of his weapon and closed one eye, taking better aim at the young soldier.

York stood defiant.

Charney’s patience had ended.

There was only one thing left to do.

Charney pulled the trigger.

York winced.

Fate intervened.

The pistol jammed.

“Mon Dieu!” spat out an angry Charney.

He quickly pulled the barrel back to recharge the weapon. He seemed a bit frantic. A bullet ejected, and a new one was chambered.

He re-aimed, but before he could pull the trigger, he felt a long, brass candelabra smash heavily into his shoulder, sending the pistol to the other side of the room.

Both men straddled Charney; they had the advantage. The pistols were on the floor between them. Michael was on his feet, the candelabra still in his hands. York crept forward.

Charney was holding his shoulder tightly, trying to squeeze away the pain. His eyes darted from left to right, from Michael to York. He smiled devilishly at the two men, at the predicament he was facing.

He had never been so challenged.

He enjoyed it.

The room was still and the moment felt long, but it was really only a fraction of time. Charney seized it.

Michael staggered under the weight of the candelabra and from the torment running through his thigh. His leg felt ready to split open, and it showed.

Charney bolted at Michael, the weaker of the two; it was the logical choice. Michael countered, but could only manage a meager defense.

Lowering his good shoulder, Charney put all of his weight into Michael’s ribs, sending him roughly backward and once again to the floor.

Charney lunged for the weapon, but York was already there. Charney jumped to his feet and disappeared through the crypt’s entry the moment a bullet from his own gun ricocheted across the marble.

The shot hit where his head had been only a moment before.

York cursed. “Son of a bitch! Who the hell is that guy?!”

York ran to Michael, who was gingerly rising to his feet. “Kid, let me see that map book.”

Reaching into his pocket, York pulled out the map book and handed it to Michael. Michael thumbed through it, but none of it made any sense. There were pages of maps of the Middle East. The maps were like any other: locations of villages, towns, and cities; elevation markings, water sources, grid-squares, but nothing more.

York repeated his question. “Doc, who is that guy; why did he want the maps?

“That is precisely what we are going to find out. He’s not the only one good at stealing things.”

Michael was holding a small leather billfold in his hand; he was smiling, albeit painfully. While the two men were grappling, Michael had been able to reach into Charney’s pocket and pilfer his wallet.

Michael opened it and pulled out an identification card. He studied it for a moment and then shrugged.
Why can’t, just for once, the next stop be in the same damn town—hell, the same damn country even?

Looking at York, he asked, “How’d you get from Mumbai to Portugal?”

“I was at the airport and overheard a Brit that had just arrived. He was on a month-long business trip. He kinda looked like me, although I am much better looking, so I followed him into an airport bar and stole his passport. I used it to fly here.”

“You still have it?”

York patted his pocket and replied, “Yep. Still got it.”

Michael smiled. “It’ll be better than the one I gave you. Looks like we’re going to Paris, kid.”

CHAPTER FIFTY-NINE

BOUND & ALONE
LOCATION UNKNOWN

S
onia was afraid, very afraid.

She had been robbed of her senses. Day could have been night; she had no concept of time.

Her hands were bound tightly behind her back, and the blindfold was still on; the man that had abducted and bound her had left hours ago—it could have been longer. He still had not come back.

Time had no meaning. She guessed twelve hours had passed, but it could have been much longer. There was nothing to give away anything temporal.

She vacillated from bouts of uncontrolled energy, as she blindly searched her prison, to fragments of sleep. The quiet that surrounded her played with her senses. She had no barometer for time and location.

Her fits of fear and feelings ranged from primal to angry. On her feet, she scrambled around the room once more—an act that she repeated often—feeling the walls with her bound hands, feeling for anything that would tell her where she was. It had been this way countless times, too many to remember. The walls were made of large blocks of stone, of this much she could be sure.

They were cold and wet.

They were bulbous.

The air had a chill in it and smelled dank; she knew that she was underground, in a basement perhaps. Each time that she repeated this action, she hoped for something more revealing, but it never came.

When the man had abducted her, she was rendered unconscious and awoke facing a camera, forced to give her husband a message. Then her abductor covered her mouth once more with chloroform—time passed, and she didn’t know how much.

When she woke, all she heard were the sounds of a truck, and she felt as if her head was in a fog. She was in the back of the truck, forced to lie on her stomach. The road was rough, as if made from uneven brick, bouncing her body relentlessly on the floor. It was then that she had first felt the intense throbbing in her right leg, the center of which burned excruciatingly.

In her prison, she struggled to feel and to hear any clues to where she was. But there was no sound other than what she made as she shuffled around the room. She felt disconnected from her space, from time.

It was small and square. She was sure it had no windows.

Her moments in the cell had started with screams—screams which no one answered. It didn’t take long for her voice to go hoarse and then for it disappear entirely.

She no longer cared if the man came back. She put her face onto the wall; she used the roughness of the stone to catch the fabric of the blindfold. Soon it was off. She waited for a moment to allow her eyes to adjust. The darkness of the room was nearly absolute, and she could make out little. The only source of light was from the small space between the room’s wooden door and the floor.

Dropping to the floor, on her back, she struggled to slide her bound hands under her backside. It took a bit of effort, and she knew that the inevitable would occur. When the dull pop came, she screamed. But with her voice long since robbed, her scream was more physical than audible. The dislocation of her shoulder was a pain unlike any that she had ever felt.

Holding her breath and fighting through her tears, Sonia soon had her hands at her front.

Unable to raise her arms, she knew the shoulder had to be forced back into its socket first. Without so much as a palpable hesitation and with her breath still held, she rammed the shoulder into the wall. The force was Newtonian, propelling her backward and onto the floor. It hurt as much going in as it did coming out. On the floor, she writhed. This time, a scream did escape.

Nearly hyperventilating, Sonia struggled to gulp large amounts of air. Tears streamed down the sides of her cheeks. Soon, however, her breathing was back in her control. Sitting up, she gingerly raised her arms to survey the rope. It was thick, and she put it between her teeth. It was easier to undo the knot than it had been to get her hands to her front.

She stretched her sore shoulder and massaged her wrists, making her way to the door. The handle turned, but the door stayed secured to its frame.

It was bolted from the other side.

She dropped to her stomach and put one eye to the crack at the bottom.

All she saw were lengths of white, nothing more.

As she sat back against the wall, the pain in her right leg suddenly appeared. Writhing slightly, she let out a short scream and gripped her thigh with both hands. Large beads of sweat quickly trickled across her forehead. A wave of nausea exploded from her midsection as she heaved, but the convulsions were dry. There was nothing in her stomach.

The pain would come and go; each time was worse than the last.

She controlled her breathing and focused on staying calm. Slowly it abated.

Sonia buried her face deep into her hands and cried. Her fear had returned.

Please, Michael, please come to me.

CHAPTER SIXTY

BECOMING THE HUNTER
TO PARIS: NINE HOURS
LEFT

T
he flight to Paris had passed mostly without incident. Except, that is, for York’s loud snoring.

The sonorous snoring was baritone and resonated in the plane’s interior. York was doing his best to mimic the deep rumble of the long-horned, copper Tibetan dungchen; Michael was amazed that each deep inhalation was followed by the long elephant-like bellow of the monks’ traditional horn. The first time may have been amazing and a bit amusing perhaps, but the second a bit less; by the third and fourth snores, York was receiving angry glares from the other passengers.

It almost took Michael’s mind off how much he hated to fly.

Michael elbowed the young man sharply, which seemed to help. But it was like this for the entire flight. The cycle was repetitious: York would snore, Michael would elbow him; it would stop for a few minutes. Michael sipped his Grey Goose as he continued to nudge him sharply—by the time each glass was finished, a third or fourth elbow would have been thrown.

As the plane prepared to land, the overhead chimes, followed by the flight attendant’s voice, woke York. He stretched his long arms and quite contently said, “Damn, that felt good! I slept like a baby.”

He looked around and noticed that a number of the passengers were glaring at him oddly. Leaning in toward Michael, York asked, “Did you notice that we’re gettin’ a bit of the evil eye? Do you think we smell or something?”

“Yeah, kid—
or something
.”

York stretched a bit more and couldn’t help but notice that Michael had a few empty travel-size bottles of vodka. In his hand was a small glass with ice and one last swallow.

Michael swirled the glass slightly; the ice slapped the inside of the glass, and then he lifted it to his lips and swallowed.

York saw no mixer. He had been drinking it straight.

After the plane landed, the CIA officer and Green Beret located a cabstand. Michael leaned heavily against a signpost, working hard to not show the pain that radiated through him. The vodka had helped, albeit only slightly. He looked at his watch: just over nine hours.

He looked like a broken boxer.

As Michael used the pole for support, he breathed slowly; he closed his eyes for a moment. Only nine hours stood between him and death. In nine hours, he would know if his life was over, if he would ever see Sonia again. In nine hours, his life would change.

He just didn’t know in what way.

They were outside of the terminal at France’s Charles de Gaulle (CDG) airport. The air was warm and a bit humid. Not as warm as Granada, but without the breeze from the Mediterranean, it felt palpably hotter. York pulled at his collar slightly; a thin film of sweat was already there.

Michael looked through Charney’s wallet; he studied an address. He raised his hand, and a cab pulled next to the curb within moments. He pointed at York to jump into the cab. Inside, the pain in his leg had spread to his voice when he told the cab driver, “Place de l’Opera: le Sentier, s’il vous plait.”

“Oui, monsieur.”

York stared at Michael: “You speak French, too?”

“Enough,” grimaced Michael.

“What are we going to do?” York asked as he motioned toward Michael’s leg.

“We are going to stay focused on Paris, on our mission, kid. Nothing more.”

York frowned but knew by now that Michael was a serious man and meant what he said. It wouldn’t help to push the discussion.