Author: James R. Hannibal
Category: Thriller
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In retrospect, Talia should have put it all together earlier, especially with Tyler’s fixation on religion, the obsession with crosses and orthodox art. But the whole faith and forgiveness angle had surprised her. Still, she wasn’t buying it. How could a heartless God, the same God who had stolen her father away, forgive a professional assassin? “I don’t want to poke holes in your delusion, but I’m not sure that’s how God works.”
The harshness of her response did not seem to faze Tyler. “Then you should look into a man named Saul of Tarsus. He was the one looking after the coats.” He looked out through the frosted glass to check on Val. “Oops. Here we go.”
Ivanov walked straight to Val once he emerged from the customs station, and Talia did not appreciate the way he took her hand when she greeted him. Val made a gesture toward the parking lot doors, and the two set off with Bazin trailing behind, handling the luggage.
“That’s it?” Talia asked.
Tyler stood, laying a few euros on the table. “That’s it. She’s in.”
“What now?”
His phone buzzed, and he checked the screen. “Now we head back to the chateau. It looks like your hacker is in a bit of a tizzy.” He showed her a text from Eddie.
GET BACK HERE. URGENT.
Chapter
thirty-
eight
ROUTE A36
NORTHWEST OF MILAN, ITALY
TYLER DIDN’T WAIT until they had reached the chateau to find out what had Eddie all riled up. As soon as he was clear of the airport, speeding toward the Alps, he used the Tesla’s seventeen-inch display to initiate a call. The chateau’s great room appeared, with Eddie in the extreme foreground.
“Is that your iPad?” Talia asked.
“What else would it be?”
She didn’t answer.
Eddie tilted his head to one side. “You have no idea how huge your head and shoulders are right now. It’s like I’m Jack, looking up the giant’s nose from the palm of his hand.”
“Focus, Eddie,” Tyler said, stealing a glance at the display. “What’s going on?”
The geek winced. “I’m . . . having trouble locating Finn, our Aussie cat burglar. There are no extreme air shows in the near future and no rumors of his whereabouts. He’s vanished.”
“Auction houses.” Tyler steered the Tesla around a slow-moving semitruck.
“I’m sorry?”
“Look into the big auction houses, Europe only. Cross-reference big-ticket items smaller than a bread box with buyers who own penthouses in the big skyscrapers.” Tyler left it at that.
Eddie blinked. “Okay.”
“You’ll figure out the rest. Is that why you texted me? You needed help with Finn, that’s what was so urgent?”
“Uh . . . negative.” Suddenly the geek was whispering. He tilted the iPad so they could see over his shoulder. A giant Scotsman with close-cropped red hair and a skintight Bad Boy MMA shirt was seated in one of Tyler’s oversize chairs, making it look less oversize than normal. He was devouring a plate full of leftover dumplings. The iPad centered on Eddie again. “He’s here. He’s big. He’s scary. And he’s eating everything in the house. I don’t know what to do.”
“Got it. That makes a lot more sense.” Tyler pressed down the accelerator, engaging the instant response of the dual electric motors. “We’ll be there in thirty-five minutes.”
THIRTY-FIVE MINUTES was not fast enough for Eddie. When Talia and Tyler came through the door, they found Macauley Plucket in the big chair closest to the fireside, surrounded by empty plates. He was picking his teeth with a toothpick, gaze fixed on Eddie, who was huddled up at the far end of the couch across the room like a hunted rabbit holed up in a hedge.
“How is our newest team member?” Tyler asked as Conrad took their coats.
“Demanding, sir, with an appetite to rival a horde of locusts.” Conrad looked over his shoulder with a worried smile. “Your Red Leader will need some coaching as to how one behaves around hardened criminals, or he may soon be gobbled up as well.”
As Tyler walked down the short stair to meet his guest, Talia whispered in his ear. “Remember, you’re Lukon.”
He cast her a sideways glance. “Thanks. I know who I am.”
Tyler handled the introductions while Conrad collected the dishes surrounding the chair.
“Call me Mac, lass.” The Scotsman took Talia’s hand, then snapped his fingers before Conrad could escape to the kitchen. “Oi, Gran’pa. I’ll take more o’ them dumplins if you got ’em.” He thrust an elbow toward Eddie. “And bring somethin’ for Wee Man too. He’s lookin’ a bit malnourished.”
The room turned cold.
The smile on Tyler’s face turned deadly. “I’m glad you’re with us, Mr. Plucket, but in the future, you will refer to our cook as ‘Conrad’ or ‘sir.’ And if you ever snap your fingers at him again, I’ll remove your hand and let him serve it back to you as an appetizer.”
Mac took a step back. “Yeah. All right. I was just gettin’ a feel for the peckin’ order.”
“And I’m Red Leader,” Eddie added, standing up behind Tyler with clenched fists. A hard look from Mac forced his eyes to the floor. “Or whatever.” Instead of returning to the couch, Eddie fled upstairs.
Tyler’s instant transformation left Talia wondering how much of the former contract killer was still in there. Enough, it seemed, to cow a bruiser three times his size. His smile shifted from deadly to warm again, and he reclined in a high-backed chair. Conrad stoked the fire, and the group chatted. Talia noted the easy way Tyler lured Mac into sharing details of his enforcement jobs—employers, dates, locations. Then their discussion turned toward the heist.
“I get Wee Man,” Mac said. “He’s yer hacker. I get this Valkyrie woman, yer grifter. An’ I’m yer pilot, one of four men in a thousand-mile radius that can handle this Mark Seven o’ yours, and the only one o’ the lot with a criminal hist’ry.” He nodded at Talia. “But I don’ get her—sittin’ over there all prim and proper like she’s better’n the rest of us. What’s her part in all this?”
He had her. Talia had forgotten. The Scotsman was not your average bruiser, all brawn and no brains. He was smart—astronaut smart. She had that sinking feeling that comes from not studying for a pop quiz. “I—”
Tyler cut her off, utterly relaxed, crossing his legs and folding his hands on his knee. “She’s CIA.”
Talia glared. Had Tyler just sold her out?
Mac glared as well, starting to come out of his chair. “She’s what?”
“CIA. Which, as you know, translates to a little corrupt and grossly underpaid. Who do you think brought me the details for this heist? Relax, Mr. Plucket”—he gave Talia a sharp play along if you want to live glance—“Talia is no threat. She’s the source of your future payday.”
Mac was too smart to take his line at face value. He sat back down, narrowing one eye at Talia. “Who’s to say she’s not playin’ us?”
“No one.” Talia forced herself to look calm under his stare. She glanced toward Tyler, remembering the part he was playing—a part it seemed he had played before. “But I am certain you’re familiar with Lukon’s own history with the Agency. When I brought him this opportunity, he assured me of the consequences should I betray him. That’s not a risk I plan to take.”
Mac did not get the chance to push the argument.
Eddie came down the stairs, peeking around the fireplace at Tyler. “I’ve got him.”
“Got who?” Talia asked.
“Finn. I know where he’ll pop up next.”
Chapter
thirty-
nine
CHATEAU TICINO
CAMPIONE D’ITALIA, SWITZERLAND
“I LOOKED INTO THE CURRENT LISTINGS at the big auction houses,” Eddie said as the other three joined him in Mission Control. “Like you said—Phillips, Sotheby’s, Christie’s. And I cross-referenced the priciest small pieces with buyers who own ultra-high penthouses.” He let the statem
ent hang, making no move toward his remote keyboard. Eddie knew how to string out a moment.
Talia rolled a finger in the air. “Annd you found Finn’s next target, correct?”
“It’s epic.” Eddie threw both hands up toward the rafters. “Epic, I tell you.” He brought his fingers down on the keyboard, and the white glowing lines of a holographic blueprint appeared, looking as if they were suspended a foot in front of the center of the parabolic screen.
“You figured out the holographic mode.” Tyler folded his arms, chuckling.
“Oh yes.” Eddie looked back with a smile. “Yes I did.” The holographic blueprints rotated, scrolling up from the base of a narrow, pyramid-shaped skyscraper all the way to its jagged top. “Meet the Shard, in London, the tallest building in Western Europe.”
The faint grin on Tyler’s lips dropped into a frown. “Eddie, there are no residential tenants in the Shard. All the penthouses are empty.”
“Correction. The penthouses were empty.” The blueprint shifted to a top-down view, looking down through the space between the massive glass panels that served as the Shard’s spires. “The four facets of the Shard are triangular panels built to look like uneven shards of glass leaning together. They don’t meet at the edges, though, leaving all four corners of the main building open to the air, along with the top fifteen floors.”
Talia didn’t need a lecture on the building’s architecture. Standing there in close proximity to Mac made her uncomfortable, as if by breathing the same air, the Scotsman would realize she was planning to betray him. “Get to the point, Eddie.”
“Enter Livingston Boyd.” On the screen, left of the hologram, an article covering a wealthy Londoner came up. “Oil and gas magnate in his twenties. Wildly influential. The Shard developers have been unable to fill the top-floor penthouses, but Boyd and one of his sheik buddies cut a secret deal to build three new penthouses suspended in the upper deck.” Animated lines appeared within the hologram, forming new structures between the glass spires. “Construction began last year under the guise of utility work.”
As usual, Eddie had fallen short of reaching the full point, thanks to the roundabout, level-by-level thinking of a gamer. He preferred to let his audience come up with the solution to beat the final boss. Talia put the last two pieces into place. “And now Boyd is furnishing his new home in the sky with expensive trinkets, one of which Finn will attempt to steal.”
“Nailed it.” Eddie set the keyboard down, giving her a near-silent round of applause. “Boyd purchased a jeweled Fabergé carriage from an auction at Sotheby’s two days ago. Armored transport brought it to the penthouse yesterday.”
Mac walked around the table to paw at the hologram. His hand passed right through. “If he wants the prize so much, why wouldn’t this Finn character hit the armored transport?”
“What would be the fun in that?” Tyler asked. He turned to leave. “Finn will go in tonight. We need to get to London.”
ON TYLER’S INSTRUCTIONS, Mac landed the Gulfstream at an uncontrolled airfield south of London. He was not happy about being left behind to guard it. “Oi, Lukon.” The Scotsman poked his great noggin out of the hatch as Tyler and Talia walked across the open apron. “I’m not a one-trick wonder, ya know. I have other skills.”
“I know all about your other skills.” Tyler turned, walking backward. “But tonight I want you keeping the jet safe and warm. And Mr. Plucket”—he pointed two fingers at his eyes, then directed them at the green hills beyond the runway—“keep a sharp eye. There are thieves about.”
Talia suspected Tyler had ulterior motives for making Mac do all the piloting that night. He had closed himself off in the jet’s rear bedroom for most of the flight. “What were you doing back there?” she asked as the two boarded a late-night bus into the city.
“Napping.” Tyler pulled a pair of Oyster public transport cards from a satchel and swiped them across the reader next to the driver. He handed one to Talia. “I’m old. Remember?”
“Ha-ha.” The bus lurched into motion, and Talia grabbed a yellow bar to steady herself as she followed him down the aisle. “I heard voices through the door. I guess you do a pretty good impression of Eddie for someone talking in their sleep.”
They sat across from each other, on seats upholstered with riotous pink-and-blue confetti. “You’re right,” Tyler said. “Eddie did call. He thinks our chemist is also in London.”
“And . . .”
“And I told him to get ahold of her.”
The bus let them off at the south end of the London Bridge and they strolled down Bridge Street to the base of the Shard. Talia had to tilt her head way back to see the point where the skyscraper’s four jagged panels pierced the London clouds, more than a thousand feet above the Thames. It made her dizzy.
She swallowed. “Uh . . . How do we know Finn is up there?”
“He isn’t. Not yet.” Tyler nodded at a stock ticker, visible through the windows of the adjacent building. The clock below read three minutes to midnight. “Think of the Shard as a vertical city with a late curfew. The city closes its gates at midnight, and reopens them at 4:00 a.m.”
“So Finn has a four-hour window to steal the Fabergé.”
A street vendor in the corner of the Shard’s small square was packing up his cart for the night. Four pounds and a tip of his flatcap bought Tyler two steaming cups of candied nuts. He gave one to Talia. “We may have a long wait ahead.”
She didn’t get the chance to ask how Tyler planned to get to the top of the vertical city. She didn’t need to. The answer came sauntering across the square—a man dressed in the high-visibility coveralls of a window washer. Talia popped a candied nut into her mouth. “You did more than nap and talk to Eddie on the plane, didn’t you?”
“Follow my lead. He thinks I’m just a rich guy looking for a thrill.”
Talia snorted. “Aren’t you?”
Chapter
forty
THE SHARD
LONDON, UNITED KINGDOM
TYLER TOOK ON A LIMP as they walked out to meet the man, who introduced himself as Bert, and passed him a thick envelope.
Bert tucked it into his coveralls and bid them follow him up an escalator to an open garden on the northwest corner of the structure. The escalator had been shut down for the night. “Six hundred thousand square foot o’ glass,” Bert said as they climbed the steps, taking it slow in deference to Tyler’s fake limp. “Includin’ the main panels and the open nooks at each corner—them nooks is the ’ard part. And who do ya think cleans ’em all, eh?”
“You?” Talia gave him her best, brainless Oh my! face.
“Correct, miss. Me and my boys.” They came to a steel service door. Bert opened it with a simple key. With Tyler’s skills—and hers—Talia wasn’t quite sure why they needed the window washer. At least he was courteous. He opened the door for her. “After you, miss.”
“Bert is the chief window cleaner and bottle washer here at the Shard,” Tyler interjected. They entered a small locker room filled with gear and overalls. “Right, Bert?”
“That’s the size of it, gov. Twelve of us in all. We do the insies, outsies, squeegin’, an’ repairs.” He laid a hand on the door at the opposite end of the locker room. “But we don’t do floors, yeah?” Bert laughed. “That’s a window washer joke, it is. You know. ’Cause most ’ousemaids don’t do—”
“We get it.” Tyler pointed at the door. “Is that the way to the box?”
“Yeah. Sure, gov. Follow ol’ Bert.” As Tyler limped past, the window washer gave him a nudge and a wink, whispering a little too loud. “Lucky man, gov. That un’s a beaut, she is.”
Talia did her best not to wonder what he meant by it.
Beyond the second door was a glass chamber with a window washer’s basket inside, cables running up into darkness. The chamber doors were reinforced with steel ribs and protected by numeric keypads.
Bert swiped a card and entered his code, and the door popped open. He bo
wed and motioned Talia through. “Your chariot awaits, miss. Green arrow for up. Red for down. Don’t touch anythin’ else. And don’t get any fingerprints on my glass, yeah?” He helped Tyler up into the carbon fiber basket second, catching him as Tyler stumbled. “Easy does it, gov.”
Talia caught another wink as Bert closed the glass door. She waited until the basket had risen two floors before asking Tyler about it. “Okay, what was up with all the nudging and winking?”
“Bert thinks I’m about to propose.”
She closed her eyes. “Of course he does.” After a long pause she added, “When we get back to the chateau, you and I are going to sit down and brainstorm some new cover stories that don’t involve marriage or engagements.”
The night air grew colder as the basket rose past the third floor in one of the open nooks running all the way to the top. Bert had placed them in the northwestern corner, which had the best view of London proper. The lights of the Tower Bridge and St. Paul’s came into view. Talia turned away. The higher they went, the less she wanted to look.
Tyler rested his hips against the basket rail next to the controls, settling in for the climb. “Tiffany’s, Mac Jazeera, a dozen major banks, and global investment groups—they’re all here. Lexan glass, biometric locks on the office doors, a small army of security in the lobby and on the fifty-fourth floor. But the service entrance and elevators for the window washers?” He chuckled. “It’s the same all over London. You want quiet access to a high-security building, you talk to the Washers Guild. They’re the chimney sweeps of the twenty-first century.”
The basket moved upward at a crawl. Talia felt like pacing, but she had nowhere to go. “Eighty floors. We’ll miss Finn at this rate.”