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The rear hatch swung up, and two men stood there, staring at the gun in her hand.
“Kill her,” the slim one said to the gorilla. He took a step toward the car.
Meg recalled something Stone had said: “Shoot first, think later.” She aimed between his eyes and very deliberately squeezed the trigger. Her aim was off; a hole appeared over his left eyebrow, and his legs seemed to collapse. He fell below the tailgate, out of sight. Meg swung left to fire at the other man, but he was not there. She heard a scrambling in the bushes beside the car. Still holding the gun, she got herself out the rear door of the SUV. The gorilla was lying on his back, blood pooling in his left eye socket. The other eye stared straight ahead, looking surprised. She thought about putting another bullet in his head, but thought better of it. He seemed dead enough.
BERIA RAN STRAIGHT through a thick line of tall shrubs and heard vehicles coming closer. He plunged into more bushes on the other side of the road and kept going, flailing at the brush to keep from putting his eyes out. He kept on and on, then, exhausted, collapsed and fell, still in thick brush.
MEG PATTED the big man’s pockets, looking for a phone, then found it on the ground near his body. She picked it up and dialed Stone’s number.
“BERIA?” Stone said.
“Hardly,” Meg replied. “How did you confuse him with me?”
“Meg?” he cried. “You’ve got Fred’s phone—did they let you go?”
“Hardly,” she replied. “I freed myself and got out the gun you gave me, and when they opened the rear hatch, I shot the big one in the head. The other one moved too quickly for me, so he’s out in the bushes somewhere. I could hear him thrashing about. I’m on a rough road with large, thick bushes on both sides. Apart from that, I’ve no idea where I am.”
She could hear Dino say, “I’ve got another fix, on Wards Island.”
“Meg,” Stone said, “we know where you are. It’s a place called Wards Island, in the East River. A whole lot of police are coming for you now, so just stand in the road and flag them down.”
“All right.”
“Oh, and put the gun away. They’ll be pretty wired, and you can give it to them later, when it won’t cause them to shoot you.”
“Okay, done. It’s in my handbag. Oh, here comes a car!”
“You’re safe, kiddo. Tell them to bring you home.”
Dino got on the phone and issued instructions to secure the scene and to bring the woman to him. He hung up and slapped Stone on the back. “We got her back, didn’t we?”
“I guess we did,” Stone said. He phoned Major Bugg. “You can stand down, now. Everything has been resolved here.”
“Actually,” the major said, “everything’s been resolved here, too. Your man arrived, and he took a swing at me with a large pistol, so I took it away from him and gave him a stern rap on the head. He’s bleeding on the carpet, I’m afraid, but we’ll deal with that. I’ve already called an ambulance.”
“Good work, Major,” Stone said.
STANISLAV BERIA managed to get across the bridge to Randall’s Island and hail a cab. He gave the driver an address two blocks from his mission, a building occupied by the Russian intelligence service. He knew the mission would be watched.
“Jeez, mister,” the cabbie said, “what happened to you? Your face is all scratched up.”
“I got lost,” Beria said. “Now get me out of here.”
“DID YOUR MEN find Beria?” Stone asked Dino, as he hung up his phone.
“Not yet,” Dino said. “He hasn’t returned to the mission.”
Stone picked up his phone and dialed a number in Washington, D.C.
“Hello,” Holly Barker said. Holly was the current secretary of state, under President Katharine Lee.
“Hello, it’s Stone.”
“What a surprise! How long has it been, a month?”
“Oh, not as long as that.”
“Hang on a minute, I just got in from the office. Let me pee and pour myself a drink, and I’ll be right back.” She put him on hold.
Stone put a hand over the phone. “I’m on hold,” he said to Dino. “Holly is peeing.”
Finally, she came back online. “There, that’s better. I’m in a comfortable chair in my study, with my shoes off, my feet up, and a stiff Knob Creek in my fist. How the hell are you? What’s going on?”
“We’ve had quite a day up here. A client of mine was kidnapped by some Russian thugs, but we got her back.”
“Any Russian thugs I know?”
“A guy named Stanislav Beria and his thug, name of Ivanov.”
“Beria? That piece of shit? He’s nothing but diplomatically protected trouble. I’ve been looking for an excuse to deport him.”
“Maybe I can help out there. He and his thug disabled Fred and took my client, trying to steal plans for a driverless car her company has built.”
“I’ve read about that. Is she all right?”
“The police have her now. They’re bringing her to my office. Is what I just told you enough to get Beria deported? Oh, I forgot to mention that Beria and Ivanov murdered two American citizens a few days ago.”
“Consider it done. I’ll have him declared persona non grata inside an hour. You want Ivanov gone, too?”
“He’s already gone—bullet to the head.”
“Well, that saves us some trouble, doesn’t it?”
“Certainly does.”
“Better let me hang up and get the paperwork started before everybody leaves the office. I came home early with a headache, but it’s gone, now. I’ll call you back tomorrow morning?”
“Okay.”
Holly hung up.
Meg rushed into Stone’s office. He rose to greet her, and she flung her arms around him. “God, I’m glad to see you.” She hugged Dino. “You, too.”
“Are you at all hurt?”
“I’ve got a headache—they drugged me—but I woke up sooner than they planned.”
“Did you really shoot Ivanov?”
“I shot the first guy I saw. He didn’t have time to introduce himself. Did you catch the other one?”
“Beria?” Dino asked. “Not yet, but he’ll seek diplomatic shelter, and Stone just got him declared persona non grata by the State Department. He’ll be out of the country tomorrow for good.”
Meg fished her pistol out of her purse and handed it to Dino. “I guess I should give this to the cops.”
Dino pocketed the weapon.
“What about Owaki?” Meg asked Stone. “How did the hearing go?”
“Couldn’t have gone better,” Stone said. “He’s in jail pending trial, and that will be months. They’ve got him cold on a weapons charge, and the U.S. attorney will get him twenty years on that.”
“He’ll probably plead out and serve ten,” Dino said, “but the feds have grounds to get his citizenship revoked, and they’ll kick him out of the country permanently.”
BERIA ENTERED a key code to the front door of an anonymous East Side town house a couple of blocks from the Russian mission and let himself in. A guard was waiting and he was shown in immediately to see the duty officer.
Beria presented his diplomatic passport. “The ambassador called,” the officer said, dropping the passport into a drawer and closing it firmly. “The State Department has declared you persona non grata. You will be driven to your flat, where you will pack your bags, then to JFK Airport. You’re on an eleven PM flight to Moscow, where you will answer to a personnel board for your actions.”
“Owaki will take care of all that. I’ll be living in London or Paris in a week.”
“Mr. Owaki is in the Federal Detention Center, without bail, awaiting trial on certain weapons charges. I think you are more likely to be residing in some small town in Siberia, rather than London or Paris, for the remainder of your career.” He motioned to an aide. “Put him in a car and get him out of here.”
“I’M HUNGRY,” Meg said. “I never got lunch, and I’m dying for a drink.”
“I can do that,” Stone replied.