Travers shrugged. “Long flight not to get off the plane. Figured you’d want a chance at a little action.”
The man chuckled softly, then said, “I might be seeing more action than you tonight, kid.”
“Whatever.” Travers left the aircraft, then climbed into the van with his men.
* * *
• • •
When he was gone, the man in the back of the cabin called up to the front. “Sharon?”
The flight attendant stepped up as the man dialed a number on his phone. “Sir?”
“I’m going to put you on the phone with someone. He’s going to give you some direction for this evening.”
She cocked her head. “Yes, sir. Can I ask what this is about?”
“Of course. He is going to tell you that you are to do whatever I tell you to do.”
“I’m sorry, sir. I don’t know who you are, but I am pretty certain I don’t work for you.”
“No, you don’t. But you do work for him.”
He tapped a button, putting his sat phone on speaker, and then a voice said, “Miss Clarke. This is Matthew Hanley, DDO. I need you to listen very carefully.”
The flight attendant sat down in a captain’s chair with wide eyes.
“I’m listening, sir.”
* * *
• • •
I sit in my rented flat on the Ruga Giuffa, watching the last of the day’s light fade through the dirty windows. I caught a few hours’ sleep and I ate in a restaurant down on the first floor of the building, careful to sit far in the back to avoid any detection from the street.
But it’s eight forty-five p.m.; I’m back in the room and it will be full-on dark soon, which means it’s almost time for me to leave.
Before I set out I call Talyssa, who should be on the ground in Amsterdam, en route to the home of black-hat hacker Maarten Meyer. She answers on the second ring, which I take as a promising sign.
“Hello?”
“It’s Harry. You made it there?”
“I’m outside his house. I don’t think he’s home.”
“That’s okay. You knew you might have to wait.”
“I don’t know if I can do this.”
“You can, and you can call me if you need help. Remember, you have your Europol credentials and a lot of information about his crimes and the investigation under way. Come at him hard, threatening even, but then show him a way through the door. You have to make him want to work with you so he doesn’t end up in prison.”
“But . . . what if he says no? What if your plan doesn’t work?”
This isn’t going to work, I tell myself. Then I tell Talyssa, “It’s going to work. Trust me.”
After a moment she replies softly, and with no obvious confidence. “All right. I will call you when I have him.” Then she says, “While I’m doing this . . . what will you be doing?”
“I’ll be doing what I do best.”
“Which is?”
“What do you think?”
Talyssa heaves a long sigh. “You are going to try to catch someone and beat information out of them.”
“You know me too well.”
I am worried about her, just like I was back in Dubrovnik when she had been rolled up by the Albanians. But now I can’t do anything to help her. She’s on her own.
“Listen,” I say. “If it’s not working out, if you feel like you might be in any danger, then you need to just pull out of there. I can try later.”
“Later all the girls will be gone.”
“I know. I just don’t want you getting hurt.”
She sniffs into the phone. “Thank you, Harry. You be careful, too.”
Thirty minutes later I am out on the street, walking east through the artificial lights towards the Casino of Venice.
I begin focusing my attention on my mission this evening. I need to be gray, to blend in with my surroundings, more so with each step as I near my target location.
Talyssa can pull this off, I tell myself. I can pull this off, too.
It’s an affirmation borne not out of real conviction but rather out of desperation.
We have to pull this off.
* * *
• • •
Ken Cage stepped out of the bathroom off the foyer of the Mala del Brenta safe house with a long, labored sniff, then he rubbed his eyes and nose.
He grabbed his black suit coat off a leather wingback chair, slipped it on, looked to his bodyguard, and gave him an energetic nod.
Cage knew Sean Hall would understand that this meant he was ready to leave for the auction.
Hall immediately slipped on his own jacket, then radioed his team through his cuff mic. Within moments the six men appeared in the foyer and formed around their boss and their principal.
Hall gave the men last-minute instructions, then radioed Jaco Verdoorn. He had no idea where the South African and his men were stationed outside, but he knew they would be trying to spot Gentry, if he was even in the area at all.
Verdoorn acknowledged Hall’s message that the movement was beginning, but he gave the American lead protection agent no more information about his and his team’s dispersement around the route to the auction.
With a head bob by Hall in the direction of the exit, the point man on the Cage detail opened the door and the entourage began filing out. It was eleven forty-five p.m., nearly nine hours after they’d arrived at the safe house.
Cage walked along through the surprisingly cool July night, wiping sweat from his forehead with a handkerchief as he did so. He wasn’t feeling great right now; he’d done enough Viagra, cocaine, and ecstasy this afternoon and evening to flare up his angina to the point where it felt like a steam hammer was pounding around inside his chest.
For Ken Cage, a full day of sex required no small amount of external assistance, and the side effects of all the stimulants were as wearing on him as the physical activity itself.
He’d slept for a few hours after his exertions; the girls had been moved to the market in the early evening so there was nothing else for him to do, but it was an uncomfortable sleep with the drugs pumping through him.
He put away the handkerchief and, from the same pocket, pulled out a few Valium he’d staged there to calm his heart, swallowing them dry.
Still, despite his chest pain, he felt he’d had a pretty good day. He’d had sex with three of the girls, all of whom would be sold off in the next few hours to Saudi sheiks or Asian billionaires or diamond-level prostitution agencies in Belgium or Holland.