Twice a Spy_ A Novel - Keith Thomson [75]
“Haven’t been mansion-hunting yet. I’ll be sure and send you a postcard, though.”
Charlie played wistful. “I’m sure you’ve at least thought of how you’ll celebrate your successful delivery of the ADM.”
“Not really. I play ’em one at a time, and this ballgame ain’t over.”
“If it were me, as soon as I got paid I’d head straight to the best restaurant in town, order a bottle of 1954 Louis Latour and a lobster the size of a tricycle.”
Bream scoffed. “It’ll be 2010 Budweiser, thank you, and, if you must know, a rack of ribs.”
“The collateral won’t affect your appetite?”
Bream reddened. “Collateral? You’ve been hanging out with too many ‘governmentals.’ You mean ‘innocent folks turned to red mist’?”
“I suppose so.”
“If I told you it keeps me up just about every night, would that make me less of a villain in your eyes?”
“Should it?”
“Yeah. It’s not an easy decision to make. But our country needs the wake-up call. If the best and brightest were really on this case, it wouldn’t be so easy to pull off.”
That was the last thing Charlie heard.
Until the air, rushing like a freight train into the cabin, woke him.
The cabin door dangled out of the plane.
Bream was gone.
Maybe he was beneath the chute that bloomed behind the plane, framed by a violet sunset.
Charlie was back in his seat, buckled in. The sky was really beautiful, he thought.
For some reason, he wasn’t worried. Plus Drummond was still asleep. If this were any big deal, he’d be up, right?
If not, there was a long way to go before they splashed into a sea so mild that it probably wouldn’t hurt. Warm probably. Beautiful too. Molten bronze in the waning light.
“Hypoxia,” Drummond shouted over the gale. He rubbed sleep from his eyes.
“Is that what this is? That’s not good, is it?”
“Correct.”
The incoming air chilled the cabin. Charlie’s thoughts began to clear.
“Why not?”
“It affects people differently, but in all cases it’s brought about by a reduction in oxygen.” Drummond unfastened his seat belt. “Either the cabin needs to be properly pressurized or we need supplemental oxygen.”
Charlie looked out a porthole. No longer any sign of Bream.
Wobbly, Drummond started into the cockpit, reaching for the W-shaped yoke in front of the empty pilot’s seat. He toppled, his forehead cracking into the yoke. He fell sideways, landing on the other seat, and lay motionless.
The plane started to dive.
“Dad!”
No response.
“Come on!”
Nothing, not even as the buzz of sky rushing past built to a holler. Charlie wanted to get up and rouse Drummond, but he remained seated. His limbs wouldn’t respond to his will.
Adrenaline rocketed through him.
Still, he couldn’t move.
Bullets bit into Alice’s parka, creating a cloud of ice, fabric, and goose feathers. When the cloud dissipated, it appeared as if she’d been replaced on the dimly lit bus shelter bench by a rag doll, her head hanging grotesquely in one direction while her body slumped the other way, flattening against the sidewall housing a Christmas movie poster.
Having pretended to let her go, Walt and Frank emerged from behind the snowy woods across the otherwise deserted rural road, intent on confirming the kill and reclaiming the Glock, as well as the cash.
Halfway across the street, they realized they had not shot Alice but a mannequin made of packed snow, and adorned with her parka, jeans, and hat.
“I’ll let you live,” she called out to them from the thick woods behind the bus shelter. “You’re just going to have to put down your weapons and then slide them to me along the pavement.”
Walt flipped the selector on his silenced gun to an automatic setting and sent a torrent of bullets in the direction of her voice. Brass casings shimmered in the scant light as they arched over his shoulder and tapped onto the icy asphalt.
For this reason, when Alice had called to them, she’d pressed her tongue flat against the base of her mouth and pushed the sound from her abdomen through her larynx in the direction of her palate. This manner of throwing one’s voice tricks listeners into believing