“Right, boss,” Loots replied.

Jaco Verdoorn peered through his Steiner binoculars at the windows, desperate to catch even the slightest sign of movement, still hopeful that the world’s greatest assassin was in the area.

* * *

• • •

   I’ve spent the last ten minutes thinking about calling Talyssa back, but I decide against it. She sounded like she knew what she was doing, although I can only hope she was playing a bit of theater when it seemed she was about to torture the man to get him to comply. She may have to in the end, but for her sake I hope she doesn’t do anything to him that’s going to haunt her in the future.

I return my thoughts to my own predicament just in time to notice two men strolling from opposite directions, then turning up the alleyway that leads up to the casino and the building where the auction is taking place. Neither of them looks particularly out of place, but the coincidence of them converging like this causes me to focus on them carefully.

Through the binos I try to make out weapons under their clothes, or shoes or boots or watches that look tactical, or commo gear secreted away.

I see nothing, but somehow my sonar for bad guys keeps pinging.

They aren’t Mala del Brenta, and they don’t have the look or feel of Italian mob.

And these guys aren’t Ground Branch, or I doubt they are, because even if Matt Hanley is involved with the Consortium, the Ground Branch guys aren’t, so there’s no way he’d send his paramilitaries straight into their hands. Nope, these guys are moving too close to the action to be CIA officers tasked with shanghaiing me back to D.C.

So then maybe these are the dudes I’ve been looking out for since Dubrovnik. Some sort of security force for the Consortium. They are here for me, and they were out of sight when they kept their distance, but now as these two men step into darkened alcoves on opposite sides of the street and light cigarettes, they’ve officially been made.

And I know there will be more than two of these fucks out here.

They are tightening the cordon, I guess, which could mean several different things. Maybe they saw the Ground Branch personnel, so they are bringing their men in thinking there will be less chance for an altercation. Maybe they are frustrated because they haven’t detected any signs of me, so they are recalling patrolling forces to create a tighter defense for the principal.

And maybe they’ve seen me, and they are converging for the kill.

I sit here weighing my options. For the last hour I’ve been fantasizing about taking out the Director when he leaves the auction, but there are a lot of problems with that plan. He moves inside a protective bubble, this I’ve already seen, so I know I may not get a good sight picture on him from this distance before he passes out of my line of fire. Also, and this is no small thing, me firing on him from this building would send God knows how many armed goons my way, and as I’m already surrounded, it would be damn hard to slip the noose.

I consider trying to involve Ground Branch in the fight, basically finding a way to strike a match so that the two forces can duke it out while I sit up here and watch, and this may even give me an opportunity to make a play for the kidnapping victims in the building seventy yards away from me.

But no, that could lead to a bloodbath, there are still civilians around, and although the Ground Branch dudes are here to fuck up my mission, they are still my brothers, and I’m not going to trick them into a gunfight they had no intention of fighting.

I slowly determine there is nothing else I can do from this vantage point other than take more pictures, so I wait, ready to do just that when the sale is over.

But it’s not long before I hear footsteps on the same floor of the building I’m on. Two men, moving slowly and carefully.

Predators.

I have escape routes planned, taking into consideration all the access points to the floor, and since these guys are moving off to my right, I get up, leave the room, and go to the left. I’m careful with my footfalls, and careful to listen for the sounds of anyone else coming this way, but soon I’m at the rear stairs and heading down, towards the nightclub on the second floor of the building.

I arrive seconds later, the place is dull and drab and the music is shit, and I move through it.

On the ground floor I exit the stairs, make my way through an employee-only door to the kitchen of the adjoining restaurant, now closed for the night, and continue through the dark and empty space to the back door. Here, I hesitate; there’s no window, so no way to know if something awaits me on the other side, but behind me I think I hear more noise, and I wonder if the Consortium security people have decided to “flood the zone” in the hopes of rooting me out of here.

I look around me, hoping to find a cook’s uniform or a waiter’s uniform to put on before leaving. I don’t see a uniform but hanging with a mop I find a large brown rubber apron like the kind used by dishwashers. I put this on, hoping it makes me look like a late-working restaurant employee heading out for the night, and then I open the door with authority.

It’s an alleyway, narrow and high on all sides, and ahead I see a street that runs along a canal. There are boats passing by, both gondolas and powered craft, and I know this is the Grand Canal. It’s big and wide and well traveled, there are boats docked up and down the lengths of both sides, and this looks like a suitable escape route.

But only for a moment.

Then, on the street that runs alongside the canal, two men walk into view. They turn to see me, and then they stop.

Then I stop.

One of them is Travers.

We are thirty yards apart, but even from here I can tell he’s ID’d me.

I start to turn to run in the opposite direction, but before I can do so, Travers yells at the top of his lungs. “Gentry! Down!”

In the world where Chris and I operate, a shout of “Down!” doesn’t mean, Get down so I can cuff you. It means, unequivocally, Get down because somebody’s about to shoot you.

My body reacts to this with instant muscle memory; I’m barely conscious of the fact that I’m dropping like a stone. I land on my chest on the hard surface of the alley.

As I hit the deck I hear the crack of a pistol shot behind me, and then another, and then I begin rolling to my right, both to make myself a moving target and to gain access to the gun on my right hip.

After my second roll I have my weapon in my hand and I continue towards the cover of a cluster of scooters parked together, another dozen feet or so on my left.

Another shot cracks in the night, the pavement sparks a foot from my head and, as I roll, I aim between my legs and return fire—at what, exactly, I have no idea.

Simultaneous to me opening up on the shooter to the north, I hear the snapping of two handguns coming from the south by the canal. This will be Chris and the other SAC guy, engaging the asshole who’s shooting at me, and I hope I survive this shit so I can buy them a beer and thank them.