Without remorse - Tom Clancy [338]
'Yes, I will. Very well, there's a PanAm flight from Dulles to Paris tonight at eight-fifteen. I'll deliver him there if you wish to see him off. You can have him met at Orly.'
'Agreed.' Voloshin walked away.
'Why did he leave me?' Grishanov asked, more surprised than alarmed.
'Colonel, that's because he believes my word, just like I believe his.' Ritter stood. 'We have a few hours to kill -'
'Kill?'
'Excuse me, that's an idiom. We have a few hours of private time. Would you like to walk around Washington? There's a moon rock in the Smithsonian. People love to touch it for some reason.'
Five-thirty. The sun was in his eyes now. Kelly had to wipe his face more often. Watching the partly broken window, he saw nothing except an occasional shadow. He wondered if they were resting. That wouldn't do. He lifted the field phone and turned the crank. They made him wait again.
'Who's calling?' Tony asked. He was the formidable one, Kelly thought, almost as formidable as he thought he was. It was a shame, really.
'Your restaurant do carry-out?'
'Getting hungry, are we?' Pause. 'Maybe you want to make a deal with us.'
'Come on outside and we can talk about it,' Kelly replied. The reply was a click.
Just about right, Kelly thought, watching the shadows move across the floor. He drank the last of his water and ate his last candy bar, looking around the area again for any changes. He'd long since decided what to do. In a way, they'd decided that for him. There was again a clock running, ticking down to a zero-time that was flexible but finite. He could walk away from this if he had to, but - no, he really couldn't. He checked his watch. It was going to be dangerous, and the passage of time would not change it any more than it already had. They'd been awake for twenty-four hours, probably longer. He'd given them fear and let them get comfortable with it. They thought they held a good playing hand now, just as he'd dared to hope they would.
Kelly slid backwards on the cement floor, leaving his gear behind. He'd need it no longer no matter how this turned out. Standing, he brushed off his clothes and checked his Colt automatic. One in the chamber, seven in the magazine. He stretched a little, and then he knew that he could delay no longer. He headed down the stairs, pulling out the keys to the VW. It started despite his sudden fear that it might not. He let the engine warm up while watching traffic on the north-south street in front of him. He darted across, incurring the noisy wrath of a southbound driver, but fitting neatly into the rush-hour traffic.
'See anything?'
Charon had been the one to suggest that the angles precluded Kelly from seeing all the way into their building. He might try to come across after all, they thought, but two of them could each cover one side of the white building. And they knew he was still there. They were getting to him. He hadn't thought it all the way through, Tony pronounced. He was pretty smart, but not that smart, and when it was dark, and when there were shadows, they'd make their move. It would work. A dinky little .22 wouldn't penetrate a car body if they could make it that far, and if they surprised him, they could –
'Just-traffic on the other side.'
'Don't get too close to the window, man.'
'Fuckin' A,' Henry said. 'What about the delivery?'
'We got a saying in the family, man, better late than never, y'dig?'
Charon was the most uncomfortable of the three. Perhaps it was just the proximity to the drugs. Evil stuff.
A little late to think about that. Could there be a way out of this?
The money for his delivery was right there, next to the desk. He had a gun.
To die like a criminal? He watched them there, left and right of the window. They were the criminals. He hadn't done anything to offend this Kelly. Well, nothing that he knew about. It was Henry who'd killed the girl, and Tony who'd set the other two up. Charon was just a crooked cop. This was a personal matter for Kelly. Not a hard thing to understand. Killing Pam that way had been brutal