ANGELES BLANCA; AQUA AZUL AIRPORT
4:10 P.M.
“My God, it’s hot,” Alexandra said, removing her coat as a Sierratour guide ushered them across the macadam toward the first of three gleaming, Russian-built buses that had pulled up alongside the airplane.
Peters nodded. “Yeah, but it beats that deep freeze we left behind.”
“How do you read the people we talked to on the plane?”
Peters shrugged. “We’ve had verbal contact with eight people, visual contact with about twelve more. I read all the talkers as articulate, offbeat, liberal, intelligent.”
“Agreed,” Alexandra said. “Also, they all seemed pretty well traveled, if not well heeled. I suppose a trip to San Sierra isn’t going to attract your average run-of-the-mill tourist.”
“No. This could go right down to the wire on Friday night.”
“Let’s hope not. Look, maybe we should fall back and get on one of the other buses. We’ve already eyeballed the people heading for this one.”
“We can do that if you want, but I think it might look strange; too conspicuous a move for too little gain. Hell, we’re only going to the terminal.”
“You’re right.” Alexandra sighed and shook her head. “Fifty-eight people is a lot to check out.”
“Fifty-nine,” Peters replied matter-of-factly. “I overheard a couple of the flight attendants talking about a man being added to the flight list at the last minute.”
Alexandra stopped walking and pulled Peters aside to allow others to board the bus. “Now, that’s unusual. Did you get a name?”
The man shook his head. “Unfortunately, no. But it shouldn’t be difficult to find out—unless it’s some DMI agent who had to come home in a hurry. We’ll see what we can find out at the reception tonight.”
“On the other hand, anybody who could manage to get on this flight at the last minute is probably our least likely suspect.”
“Still, it’s a place to start,” Peters said, shifting his radio to his left hand and using his right to help Alexandra up the steps into the bus.
There were seats near the front, a few rows behind the driver. Alexandra slid into a seat next to a window, leaned her head back, and stared absently at a large tackboard above the windshield festooned with hundreds of small pins emplazoned with Communist slogans. Manuel Salva gazed heroically toward the back of the bus from miniature, garishly colored posters that reminded Alexandra of the pressboard cards found in packs of bubble gum.
She was confident now that she would be all right. In fact, she was pleasantly surprised to find that she actually felt good—if not totally relaxed, at least confident. The tension of the past year had drained her more than she’d realized. It was unfortunate that she’d been forced to reject John at the last moment, but it had been unavoidable. The important thing was that John would be waiting for her at their home when she returned; everything was going to work out. She now realized that she was happy to be away, working at what she had always done best. She was certain there would be no repeat of her other problem; she would not be in the field long enough to arouse those demons.
Alexandra had not forgotten that the success of their task would almost certainly be capped by death. Their target was an assassin, a “hard player.” Fair game. His life would have to be taken if the lives of others were to be saved and the interests of the United States protected. Still, Alexandra thought, Rick Peters would have to be the one to take care of that detail. Regardless of the circumstances, she did not think that she could kill, not again. And certainly not in cold blood.
The thought of a kill suddenly cast a shadow on her peace, an ominous, dark bridge to the memories of her past that chilled her. The dragon she saw there, what she had been, terrified her: the treachery and betrayal; the coldness; the lies. The terrible, enslaving bond of pain with Rick Peters.
Alexandra closed her eyes and shook her head slightly to chase the fear. This was different, she thought; the task was straightforward and of critical importance. There were no honest men to betray, only a professional killer. Reassured by that thought, she opened her eyes and felt the bulk of her misgivings leave her, melted away by the Sierran sun. She was glad she was needed, proud that she had been chosen.
A squat, broad-faced man with a ruddy complexion, dressed in an ill-fitting tan uniform, climbed up the bus stairwell, then stood in the aisle with his hands resting on the vinyl backs of the seats on either side of him. He was followed by two attractive women, a blonde and a brunette, dressed in the same type of uniform. The women stood just behind the man, smiling at the passengers over the man’s shoulders.
“Welcome to San Sierra,” the man said. “I am Raul.” His smile was tentative, his muddy-brown eyes clearly mirroring hostility and suspicion as he nodded in the direction of the blonde, then the brunette. “I would like to introduce Constantina and Maria. We will be your guides throughout your stay in our country.”
The women’s smiles grew brighter as they rapidly made eye contact with all the passengers on the bus. Their manner was warm and eager, in marked contrast to Raul’s.
“Why, it’s Mr. Sierran Sunshine,” Peters whispered.
Alexandra suppressed a smile. “DMI?”
“Who knows? Maybe he’s just constipated. If the Sierrans do seed agents into these groups, you’d think they’d choose people smooth as glass. Maybe one or both of the women.”
The man called Raul glanced quickly at Alexandra and Peters, obviously annoyed by their whispering. Alexandra flashed a broad, coquettish smile. Raul reddened slightly, then smiled back.
“We are very happy to have you here, and we think you will be very impressed with all that our small, poor country has accomplished since ninteen fifty-six.” Raul paused. His mouth was set in a grim, defiant line, as if he expected a challenge. When none came, he went on in a less combative tone.
“We have planned your trip so as to show you some of the many different faces of our beautiful country. After going through Immigration and Customs, we will board cruise buses and drive on to the Hotel Carazúl, which is about two hours away, near the town of Patanzas. Tonight we will have a lovely dinner, a tipico fish banquet, that we are sure you will enjoy.
“We will remain at the Carazúl until Tuesday morning, at which time we will go on to the Hotel Sierras Negras.” Raul paused and thrust his chest out proudly. “Sierras Negras is a mountain resort which was just completed a few years ago. It is near the mountain range where my father and uncle fought with Manuel in the glorious revolution.”
“Chickenshit,” Peters whispered without moving his lips.
“On Wednesday, those of you who are interested may take a side excursion to the very old city of Peleoro,” Raul continued. “We recommend that you all go; we think you will find it very fascinating.
“On Thursday morning we will board the buses for the last time and drive back here to Angeles Blanca, where you will stay until you leave us. Some of you may be interested in attending the boxing matches between our two countries on Friday evening. The bouts will take place on the grounds of Tamara Castle, which in itself is worth the trip even if you are not interested in boxing. If you wish to go, we will see that you receive free tickets. In San Sierra, we do not charge for admission to sporting events. We believe that sport belongs to the people, and tickets for events are given away to the workers.
“Again, we welcome you. We hope to get to know each one of you much better before the end of this journey of friendship. Are there any questions?”
There were none. There was scattered applause, and a woman in the rear of the bus shouted a revolutionary slogan. All three guides smiled appreciatively. Raul waved both hands in salute, then followed the two women off the bus.
There was a delay of a few minutes while the guides delivered the same message to the people on the other buses. Then the black-haired woman named Maria got back on the bus and they were driven slowly to the terminal building three hundred yards away.
“If we find the weapon, we find the assassin,” Alexandra said quietly as she and Peters climbed off the bus and moved out from the edge of the crowd gathering at the entrance to the terminal building. “We’ll recognize things a Customs agent wouldn’t—assuming Customs opens the right bag in the first place.”
Peters nodded. “Let’s concentrate on physical contact at Carazúl, then try to do a room search at Sierras Negras. There’ll probably be a lot of people going to Peleoro.”
“Well, at least we can be reasonably certain that our man didn’t bring a gun on board at JFK. The metal detectors would have got him.” Alexandra paused, then continued tightly, “Of course there are weapons, and then there are weapons.”
“I’ll say,” Peters said wryly, casting a quick glance at the barrette Alexandra wore in her hair. “He could have plastique, or even a disassembled one-use plastic gun. The state of the art has probably risen considerably since we worked, and the nice folks we hung around with were pretty crude to begin with.”
“I don’t think we should dismiss the possibility that he could be planning to pick up a conventional weapon here. We’ll just have to—”
Alexandra cut her words off in midsentence as she sensed that someone had come up behind her and was standing close by. She turned, and had to slap a hand across her mouth to stifle a scream.
He would wait no longer.
A sour emotional brew of tension, humiliation, and blind rage had exhausted him, leaving behind dregs of bitterness and a cooler, more sustained anger. He was even more determined to win back his wife, but first the boils of resentment resting in his heart and stomach had to be lanced. It was time, he thought, for the other side to experience a little consternation and shame. He was no longer interested in violent confrontation; it would be enough for Alexandra and Peters to discover that he was with them, to realize that he knew and that he would be watching them. He would let them react and make of it what they wished. He had a week to maneuver, to make his “case” with Alexandra, and his opening shot would be the shock testimony of his presence.
He bolted from his seat as the bus on which he was riding braked to a stop. However, he had been sitting near the rear and there was nothing he could do but wait and chafe with impatience as the passengers in front of him filed off slowly.
When he finally reached the macadam he removed his coat, walked away from his group, and surveyed the passengers who had exited from the other buses. He immediately spotted his wife and Peters; they were standing off by themselves, the lower halves of their bodies blurred by a shimmering heat wave radiating from the macadam, holding hands and gazing into each other’s eyes as they shared a whispered conversation.
As when he had first seen Alexandra with Rick Peters in the TWA terminal, John was almost overwhelmed with desire for his wife. Numbed by the beguiling familiarity of marriage, he had forgotten how much he loved her; but now the nerveless crust built up over years had been brutally ripped from his raw emotions, leaving him throbbing with a pain that would not cease.
He whipped off his hat and sunglasses and stalked forward, angling around to his right so that he would come up behind the man and woman. Alexandra and Peters were so absorbed in their conversation that John was able to approach and stop so close to Alexandra that he was almost touching her before she became aware of his presence. She wheeled, looked into his face, and her eyes went wide with shock. Her hand flew to her mouth and she made a small, strangled sound in her throat.
“It’s one beautiful day, isn’t it, folks?” John said with soft but stinging mockery. Now Peters also spun around, and John feigned surprise. “Why, if it isn’t good old Rick Peters! Rick, I haven’t seen you in God knows how long. How the hell are—”
Then he could no longer speak. Something stiff and blunt had been rammed into his solar plexus, just below his sternum. The terrible pressure lasted only a fraction of a second before being released, but the effect was devastating; John felt literally paralyzed, unable to breathe, speak, or move. He opened his mouth in a futile attempt to suck air into his lungs, then jammed his hands into his stomach and began to topple forward.
He felt Peters grab him under the left arm and haul him to his feet. “Don’t panic,” he heard Peters whisper urgently to Alexandra. “Let’s get him on the bus.”
With Alexandra supporting him under the right arm, John felt himself being dragged over the hot macadam toward the open maw of one of the shining, empty buses parked a few yards away. He was gasping like a landed fish now, but was still unable to coax any air into his lungs. His chest and the veins in his temples felt ready to explode. Writhing in agony, he rolled his eyes toward Alexandra. But his wife would not look at him. Her face showed the strain from the effort of dragging him, and her eyes gleamed with the kind of fear and confusion John had once seen in the eyes of the first and last animal he had ever shot, almost thirty years before; it was a look of human anguish, but nonetheless was not really human.
It was absurd, John thought, but it occurred to him that his wife and Rick Peters were going to kill him.
“This man’s fainted,” Peters announced in a loud voice to the people around them. “He needs to lie down out of the sun. We have medical experience; we’ll take care of him. Please just give us some room and leave us alone.”
John tried to resist as they dragged him to the entrance to the bus, but without air he was close to losing consciousness. Alexandra and Peters lifted him up the steps without apparent effort, dragged him down the aisle, and dumped him onto a seat in the middle section of the bus.
Peters knelt down in the narrow leg space beside the seat and began to rhythmically massage John’s chest with his right hand, helping him to breathe. When John looked down, he could see that the index and middle fingers of Peters’ left hand were poised, stiff as a knife blade, inches from his stomach. John closed his eyes and focused all his attention on the prodigious task of sucking air into his lungs.
“He’ll be all right,” John heard Alexandra, in the doorway, call in a slightly quavering voice to the other passengers. “Just give us a few more minutes alone with him.”
John heard the hinges of the doors squeak as Alexandra forced them shut manually. He opened his eyes, and a moment later Alexandra’s face, bone-white and almost unrecognizable to him, moved into his slightly blurred field of vision, just behind Peters. She learned over him to loosen his tie and unbutton his shirt collar.
“You have to be absolutely still and listen, Finway,” Peters said. His voice was pitched very low, but the tone was hard and unmistakably commanding. “If I think you’re going to try and shout, I’m going to shove my fingers into your gut again. Can you breathe all right now?”
John nodded, and Peters stopped massaging his chest. John considered crying out, but when he glanced down again he could see that Peters’ fingers were still in position to strike him. He fixed his gaze on Alexandra and tried to work up hate in his eyes, but he couldn’t; he knew that his eyes reflected exactly what he felt: more pain than outrage, and a terrible confusion.
“This situation isn’t what you think it is, Finway,” Peters continued in the same controlled, hard voice. “It’s a hell of a lot worse than you think it is. Right now you’ve got your wife’s freedom—and mine—in your hands. If you say just one wrong word now or in the coming week—if you even act the wrong way—your wife and I are going to stay on this island for a very long time.” He inclined his head toward Alexandra, snapped, “Tell him! Make it quick!”
Alexandra started to speak, but gagged on the words. “I … I can’t, Rick,” she choked. “I’m afraid I’m going to be sick.”
“Then I’ll tell him,” Peters said in a clipped voice, staring hard at John. “But he gets the whole story if I tell him. Nothing left out. We haven’t got time to chickenshit around. Do you still want me to do the talking?”
“Yes,” Alexandra replied in a rasping whisper.
“Go get ’em, tiger,” Harry mumbled to himself as John Finway swept down the aisle past him. Harry stood to let the woman next to him out and watched with faint amusement as Finway waited impatiently at the door, then rushed out into the bright Sierran sunshine.
Harry was not concerned about Finway being killed out on the macadam; Peters had no escape route, and there was nothing in the blond assassin’s dossier to indicate that he was suicidal. Consequently, Harry was content to slide over on his seat and watch through the window. The proverbial shit, he thought, was about to hit Peters.
What he saw impressed him—or, rather, what he did not see. Finway had barely spoken a sentence to the man and woman before he was disabled with what Harry knew had to be a finger jab to the large nerve cluster of the solar plexus; however, Peters had executed the move with such blinding speed that Harry had not caught it.
Now Harry quickly got off the bus. He paused, narrowed his eyes, and nodded in professional appreciation as he watched the man and woman drag the hurt, semiconscious lawyer across the macadam and up into the temporary sanctuary of the lead bus. A few moments later Alexandra Finway spoke briefly to the people who had followed them, then pushed the doors shut.
“Is that poor bastard going to get an earful,” Harry murmured wryly as he walked toward the swelling throng that was gathering, chattering excitedly, around the door of the bus.
He took up a position at the edge of the crowd, a few feet away from the door, and waited. He could just see the top of Alexandra Finway’s head through the window, and he knew that Peters would have the woman’s husband down on a seat while he quickly told him the same story he had told the woman. Peters would have no choice, Harry thought; their freedom, conceivably even their lives, would be in John Finway’s hands for a week.
Or it could be over much sooner than that, Harry thought as the dwarfish Raul brushed past him and, with quick, nervous shoves and shouts, began clearing his way through the crowd toward the closed door. A soldier carrying a Kalashnikov assault rifle was trotting across the macadam from the direction of the terminal building.
Harry knew he had to make a quick decision. He had no way of knowing what kind of progress Peters and Alexandra Finway were making with the woman’s husband; if Raul and the soldier burst in before Finway became sufficiently convinced of the need for him to remain silent, Peters and the woman could be out of commission, possibly for years, unless Salva bought their story that they’d been trying to prevent his assassination. Harry did not think Salva would be so obliging.
If Finway raised enough suspicions, Harry thought, Peters and his unwitting accomplice would be taken out by the Sierrans and would no longer be his concern. His job would be half done, and all he would have left to worry about was the possible existence of a second assassin who might be along to back up Peters. But that was going to be a difficult problem. Peters, at least, was a known quantity and an easy target for surveillance. Without Peters to track, Harry was keenly aware that he could spend the entire week looking for a person who might not exist, and then blow the assignment if the person was there and he missed him. Another consideration was the fact that Peters was the best, perhaps the only, source for finding out what organization had booked the assassination in the first place.
Finally, Harry thought, he had been tasked to protect Alexandra Finway, if possible. He decided it was possible.
Harry quickly pushed past the people in front of him and gripped the squat Sierran’s wrist just as the man was about to force open the door. “Excuse me, Raul. I think the man just had a little fainting spell. Maybe you should leave them alone. The blond guy and the woman act like they know what they’re doing.”
Raul looked down at his wrist as if it were the hand on it that had spoken. When Harry released his grip, the red-faced man looked up and blinked rapidly. “They can’t stay in there alone,” Raul said, his voice shrill with anxiety and annoyance.
Harry giggled. “Why not? You think they’re having an orgy?”
“It’s not regular! They must come out!”
Raul turned around to speak to the soldier, who had just come up. Harry moaned loudly, let his jaw fall slack, and rolled his eyes back up into his head. He gave Raul time to turn back, then went into a Saint Vitus dance of flapping, disjointed movements. Suddenly his right arm jerked up, the hard knuckles catching Raul under the chin. Raul grunted with pain and surprise and leaped backward, colliding with the soldier. Both men went sprawling on the ground. Harry stiffened and fell back, slamming against the door and slowly sliding down the metal surface to end in a slumped sitting position on the macadam. There was stunned silence.
If they weren’t finished inside, Harry thought, they had damn well better get finished. He twitched the muscles in his arms and legs, slowly counted to ten, then opened his eyes. “God,” he moaned, clutching his head. He slowly looked up at the staring faces surrounding him. “Oh … I’m sorry,” he said thickly. “Too much heat and excitement always gives me these spells. It’s the story of my life.”
The angry Raul and the soldier got to their feet. Raul stepped forward and glared balefully at the sheepish-looking Harry. “What’s the matter with you!?” Raul bellowed, his voice quivering with outrage.
“I … I’m afraid I fainted.”
“You had a fit! You hit me!”
Harry shook his head in confusion. “I … did?”
“Yes, you did!”
“Oh, Lord, I’m so ashamed,” Harry whined, lowering his gaze and shaking his head woefully. “I’m so sorry. Just give my head a couple of minutes to clear. I’ll be all right.”
Raul gestured in frustration, then lifted his eyes to the heavens as if, forgetting himself, he were seeking Divine guidance. “Why is everyone getting sick? We can’t even get out of the airport!”
Harry groaned, then slowly worked his way onto his hands and knees and made gagging sounds. There was the sound of feet hurriedly shuffling back.
“Are you all right, sir?”
Harry looked up to find the dark-haired Maria bending down over him. Her large, limpid eyes were filled with sympathy and concern. Constantina had arrived with a suitcasesize first aid kit and a thermos of water.
Harry drank a few sips of water, but shook his head when Constantina started to open the first aid kit. “All right,” he mumbled. “Just needed the water … some air.” He waited until Constantina rose to push the people back, then sank down on one elbow and twisted around so that he could see the bus behind him. Peters was standing in the stairwell behind the door, watching the proceedings with mild curiosity reflected in his almost colorless eyes.
“I feel much better now,” Harry said, allowing the pretty brunette to help him to his feet. “I’m really sorry, ma’am. You’re very kind.”
“It’s perfectly all right, sir,” Maria said soothingly. “The only important thing is that you’re all right. If you’ll permit it, I’ll help you through Immigration and Customs.”
Harry murmured his thanks. People began moving away, and Peters pushed the bus door open. His gaze flickered quickly, appraisingly, over Harry before he spoke to Raul and the two women guides.
“The guy inside the bus is all right now. He just had a fainting spell.”
“I’ll look at him,” Constantina said, hefting the first aid kit.
“I think he’d just as soon not attract any more attention, Constantina,” Peters said evenly. “He’s embarrassed, and he knows you all have a lot of other things to do. My friend’s had some nursing training. She’ll stay with him for a few minutes, and then they’ll be right along.”
Constantina nodded, then turned away. Peters once again looked at Harry. Harry smiled shyly, then bowed his head as though speechless with embarrassment. He glanced up in time to see Peters walking quickly through the crowd, heading for the terminal building.
“All right, everybody!” Constantina called in a voice that was authoritative yet at the same time bright and ingratiating. “Everyone’s all right now. Please! Let’s all go back to the Immigration officer. We’re running a bit behind schedule, and I imagine some of you would like to have a swim before dinner when we get to Carazúl.”
The crowd obediently turned and began shuffling toward the terminal building, with Raul and Constantina gently but firmly shepherding them along. Harry allowed himself to be guided by Maria’s hand on his elbow, leaving John and Alexandra Finway alone on the bus.
Alexandra swallowed repeatedly, but she could not work up any moisture in a mouth that was blistered and swollen from her gnawing at the soft tissue. John simply lay still, his left arm hanging limply over the edge of the seat, staring up at her. His gray eyes shone with a fever-glow of accusation and his mouth was frozen in a savage, sardonic smile. Those eyes were melting her insides, Alexandra thought. She felt small and getting smaller, as if the hard outer shell that remained were imploding; she was collapsing in on herself like a dark star, blinking out.
She had lost him, Alexandra thought, and she could not even afford to cry.
“Mrs. Alexandra Finway, Superspy,” John said at last. “I love it.”
Alexandra swallowed again. Her throat burned with thirst and the muscles at the back of her neck ached from tension, but she finally managed to speak. “Please, John,” she said softly. “We have to get off and go with the others.”
“Oh, hell, I’ll get off. But I fainted, remember? I need some time to get my poor befuddled wits together. Oh, and I almost forgot. I thought you might be interested in hearing about our children. Remember Kara, Kristen, and Michael, Mrs. Superspy?”
“Please don’t torture me, John,” Alexandra said in a hollow voice. She imagined she could actually feel John’s scorn pressing against her body like some fierce, invisible wind generated in his broken feelings and funneled through his piercing eyes; the scouring wind was threatening to blow her away. “Of course I want to know about them, but I assume you wouldn’t be here if they weren’t safe with someone.”
“Well, that just shows what a poor judge of character you really are. The fact of the matter is that I ate them. I felt like having a snack before leaving the house and there wasn’t a damn thing in the refrigerator.”
“John, please don’t act like this. We’re all in dan—”
“I’m going to rip that little bastard’s head off his shoulders when this fucking week is over,” John said through clenched teeth, hatred momentarily twisting his features. He slammed his fist into the back of the seat in front of him, then abruptly sat up.
Alexandra forced herself to wait until the initial surge of fury had passed and John’s gaze had come back to her face. “Please don’t even think about that, darling,” she said quietly, making no effort to hide her fear. “Stay away from Rick. Don’t even talk to him. Not now, and not when the week is over. If you push him, he’ll just kill you without giving it a second thought. He’s very dangerous. You don’t really know him at all.”
“Ha! I don’t know him?”
“Darling, all that we have to do is get through this week.”
John punched the seat again and glared at her. “Is that all we have to do, darling? My God, you talk about lies! You’ve been living a lie since the very goddam day we met!”
“Not so loud, John. Please. You know there’s much more at stake here than just our three lives.”
“The hell there is,” John shot back. But he lowered his voice. “Not as far as I’m concerned. Frankly, I don’t give a small shit about Salva, Russia, or the State Department, and I especially don’t give a shit about the fucking CIA. I mean, what are they thinking of, putting a forty-two-year-old mother of three children into a situation like this? This is the biggest bullshit operation I’ve ever heard of. They should’ve just picked up the telephone and called the son-of-a-bitch. Let Salva protect his own ass.”
“It was considered, John. Rick told you that. He also explained why the decision was made not to do that.”
“You spied on me.” Now John’s anger had grown cold and distant. “And you spied on my friends. That’s precisely the kind of arrogant government horseshit a few good people were struggling against in the Sixties, and it turns out my goddam bride-to-be was doing a snoop number on me!”
Alexandra realized that she was almost panting. It was hard to breathe, as though John’s anger were burning up all the oxygen in the bus. “I was doing my job. Not everyone in the counterculture acted as responsibly as you. There were outlaws. You know that.”
“You mean outlaws like Karen?”
Alexandra dropped her eyes and put a trembling hand to her forehead. “Yes,” she managed to say. “Like your sister. I’m sorry, but it has to be said. She was a bomber, and you know damn well her people weren’t planning on blowing up the Pentagon. They didn’t care who they hurt. Also, that handsome mad bomber she was sleeping with just happened to be a KGB agent.”
John stared at her, his lids narrowed and his breathing shallow. “Bullshit,” he said at last. “How the hell do you know that?”
“John, I was a good agent,” Alexandra said quietly, struggling to regain her composure. “It was my job to find out things like that. I killed him. I had to; he was going to kill me.” She paused as a new emotion that Alexandra could not immediately identify swept across her husband’s face. She was sorry she had mentioned the killing, but it was too late to take the words back. “I’m sorry if what I said about Karen hurts you, but it’s the truth.”
“A lot of things I’m learning hurt me, Alexandra. But what hurts most is to find out that you informed on me.”
“I stopped when I realized I was in love with you, and I quit the dragons when we were married.”
“But you never told me, Alexandra!” John cried out, his voice suddenly distorted with anguish.
Alexandra felt tears welling in her eyes and she struggled to hold them back. “Oh, John, can’t you understand that I was afraid of losing you?”
John heaved a great, shuddering sigh. He sucked in a deep breath, put a hand on his stomach, and slowly exhaled. His anger seemed spent. He slowly rose to his feet, squeezed past her in the aisle, then paused in the stairwell and looked back. “If you want my opinion,” he said in a low, hard voice, “this is the typical sort of quarter-assed operation our glorious CIA is justly famous for. Ever hear of Chile? Iran? The Bay of Pigs? How about San Sierra’s Beach of Fire? Well, those fiascoes all seem like master-schemes compared to this baby; it had to be thought up by the same people who brought you Watergate. This operation isn’t even quarter-assed, it’s patently insane. Your three children are the only people you owe spit to, and they’re not going to be too happy if their mother gets her ass shot off or ends up growing old in a Sierran prison. You might want to give that some thought.”
“John—”
“You don’t have to worry about me bothering the two of you, sweetheart. I won’t talk to you; I don’t even know your names. And I won’t blow the whistle on your screwball plan, if you’re still crazy enough to want to go through with it. All I want right now is to get through this week and go back … someplace.”
“I love you, John,” Alexandra said in a choked voice. “You still don’t know everything. I need you. Please help me get through this week. I have to know that you love and trust me, and that our family will be together and whole when this is over.”
But she knew he had not heard her. John had already stepped off the bus and was walking at a furious pace toward the terminal building where Raul was waiting, impatiently tapping his foot.