The Day After Tomorrow_ A Novel - Allan Folsom [279]
How could he not understand what had happened to her, not believe she was telling the truth?
“Dahimit, Paul! Listen to me—” Vera was starting to turn around, to look at him. Suddenly she stopped. There were tracks in the snow in front of them. In the bluish glow of the light, Osborn saw them too. Footprints dusted over, by fresh snow, leading from where they were directly toward the tunnel. Von Holden had stood where they were only moments before.
Abruptly Osborn jerked her aside, roughing her into the shadows against the wood and wire of the dog runs. Then he looked back, studying the tracks.
She could see him trying to decide what to do next. He was exhausted. Very nearly at the end of his rope. Von Holden was on his mind and nothing else. He was making mistakes and didn’t realize it. And if he went on as he was, in a short while Von Holden would kill them both.
“Paul, look at me!” suddenly she screamed at him, her voice rocked with emotion. “Look at me.”
For a long moment he stayed motionless, the snow falling silently around him. Then slowly, reluctantly, he turned to her. Despite the cold he was soaked with sweat.
“Listen to me, please,” she said. “It doesn’t matter how you’ve come to the conclusions you have. The truth is I’ve nothing to do with Von Holden or the Organization and never have. This is the moment when you must believe me, you have to believe me and trust me. Believe and. trust that what we have together is real and transcends anything else—anything . . .” Her voice trailed off.
Osborn stared at her. She’d hit a chord deep within him, a nerve he no longer thought was. there. If he chose no, that was one thing. Simple and done with. To choose yes was to trust beyond anything he knew or had ever known. To cast himself, his father, everything, aside. Make it all irrelevant. To say, after everything—I do trust you and my love for you—and if in doing that I die, then I die.
It would have to be total trust. Total.
Vera was looking at him. Waiting. Behind her, through the falling snow, were the lights of the restaurant. It was all on him. What he chose.
Ever so slowly he raised his hand and touched her cheek.
“It’s all right,” he said, finally. “It’s all right.”
148
* * *
VON HOLDEN came up on his elbows and inched forward. Where were they? They’d come right up to the edge of the light and then disappeared from view. It should have been simple. He’d tested Osborn by showing himself and Vera in the Ice Palace tunnel. If Osborn had followed them he would have dragged him into the side tunnel where he’d taken Vera and killed him there. But he hadn’t. Which was why he’d used Vera now. She’d been a drawing card, nothing more. He knew Osborn had seen them board the train together in Bern. The last time he’d seen her she’d been arrested by the German police in Berlin. What could he think but that she and Von Holden were- co-conspirators, fleeing the disaster at Charlottenburg. Filled with rage and betrayal, Osborn would find a way to free her and no matter her argument otherwise would make her take him to Von Holden, either as a hostage or bargaining chip.
A gust of wind twisted a snow devil across the snow in front of him. Wind. He didn’t like it. Any more than he liked the snow. Looking up, he saw a line of clouds advancing from the west. And it was getting colder. He should have killed them sooner, as soon as they’d started toward the ski school, but taking out two people and getting rid of their bodies that close to the main building was risky, especially when it might jeopardize his main objective. The air tunnel was eighty yards away from it, in the dark and snow, distant enough to be safe for the killing. And Osborn, upset and unbalanced, would follow his footprints straight toward it. The two shots a split second apart wouldn’t make a sound. Then Von Holden would take their bodies to the back of the dog runs where the cliffs fell sharply away and toss them over into the black nothing of the abyss. Osborn first, and then
“Von Holden!” Osborn’s voice echoed out of the darkness. “Vera