Things Happen That Way Page 16

  “Yes, but—”

  “I won’t get in your way, and I’m armed.” She withdrew her Smith & Wesson from the purse that hung from her shoulder, and then replaced it. “Most importantly, you’ll have someone to have your back until you find Mark.” She tilted her head. “Now, do you want to waste time discussing this with me, or shall we get this show on the road?”

  There was no point in arguing with her. Time was passing, and I had no idea what Mark might be facing.

  “Very well, Mother.” I returned to my room and took another jacket from the closet. “Here.” I handed it to her. “This is the best I can do at this time of night. You’ll need something to keep you warm, and you won’t convince anyone you’re an operative in your lynx or the fox fur.”

  “I can always count on you, sweetheart.”

  I grunted, put my cell phone in my pocket along with the room’s key card, and opened the door. “After you.”

  I had the cab driver drop us off a couple of blocks away from the warehouse. It would be safer to make our approach that way.

  Mother tucked her arm in mine, and I kept between her and the street. “I wish I had something warmer for you to wear,” I murmured.

  “I’m fine, sweetheart. I’m quite warm-blooded in spite of my reputation.”

  I gave a bark of laughter, cutting it short when I realized I had something else about which to be concerned.

  This wasn’t the best neighbourhood, and groups of young men gathered beneath streetlights. I didn’t care for the way we were being eyed. “Just one second, Mother.”

  I braced my foot against a streetlight, fumbled as if my shoelace had come untied, and transferred my Llama Mini-Max from its ankle holster to my pocket.

  As we walked on, a youthful voice trying to sound tough called out in French, “Hey, Mama. Dump the old guy. I can show you a better time.”

  “Indeed?” She paused and let her gaze run over him. He really wasn’t much more than a boy. “Why don’t you come back and ask me when you’ve got some hair?”

  I was afraid he might take umbrage at the aspersion cast on his maturity, but I should have known better. In spite of the fact that it wasn’t a very gentile way of phrasing it, in Mother’s cultured tone, it sounded like a compliment.

  Fortunately, the boy seemed to think so as well. He shrugged and laughed, and his friends laughed with him.

  I blew out a relieved breath, but kept my hand around the butt of my gun, and we continued on.

  “Old guy?” I murmured. “It’s a good thing I’m comfortable with my age, otherwise I think he would have given me a complex.”

  “Indeed,” Mother said again, biting her lips to contain her amusement. “You’re beginning to sound like Mark.” But as we neared a dingy, squat building, her expression became grim. She looked up at the shabby exterior. “So this is where you were held.”

  “Yes.” I wasn’t surprised she recognized it. I had no doubt she would have researched the warehouse and everyone involved with it after I’d returned home.

  We strolled down the alley to the rear of the building. It was three stories tall, but that was deceptive. It had four sub-basements.

  “What’s your plan, Quinton?”

  “We walk in as if we have every reason to be there. We’ll have to split up.” I wasn’t comfortable with that idea, but until I saw the lay of the land, it was a matter of divide and conquer, the only solution I could come up with.

  “Your father would have been so proud of you. I’m so proud of you.” She took her Smith & Wesson from her purse, slipped off the safety catch, then put it away. This time she didn’t fasten the bag’s clasp; she kept it open, and kept her hand in it as well.

  “Father would have been equally as proud of you.”

  “Thank you, sweetheart.” She squeezed my arm, and then stood aside so I could work.

  The door was one that slid open. I grasped the handle and gave a tug, relieved when I didn’t have to resort to lock picks, which, of course, I didn’t have with me. I’d planned on a simple rendezvous with my lover, not a night out breaking and entering. If I’d thought otherwise, I would have contacted an officer I knew who worked for a branch of MI5 not many had heard of and would have borrowed the picks from her.

  Inside, a handful of de Becque’s contingent of operatives scuttled up and down the corridor. They gave us distracted glances before hurrying on their way.

  “I’ll start with the lower levels.” The last thing I wanted Mother to see was the dank cell where I’d been kept for what had felt like an eternity, but which was in actuality less than two weeks. “You take this floor and the ones above.”

  “All right, Quinton. Be careful, please.”

  “Always, Mother, and you also.” I smiled, hoping it didn’t look as forced as it felt. I’d had nightmares for weeks after Mark had gotten me out of this fucking hellhole, and my stomach roiled at the fact that I had to go back down there.

  Why hadn’t this building been razed to the ground?

  Mother squeezed my shoulder and headed down the corridor, a woman who had every reason to be there.

  I drew in a deep breath, opened the door to the stairwell, and took the first step down.

  I stood in the doorway of what had been my cell and swallowed bile. Had it smelled this bad when I’d been imprisoned in it? Probably, and I’d simply grown accustomed to it.

  I gave a massive shudder. I’d finally been able to sleep without nightmares of that time tearing apart my nights, and now I’d have to go through that all over again. Mark was going to be disappointed in me.

  I straightened my shoulders. I was a Mann, and I would not bring shame to my forebears. I turned away from the cell. I had to explore the rest of this level.

  As it turned out, it didn’t take long. All it contained was a room that looked like a vivisectionist’s dream come true—I thanked God I’d never known it was there—and the vast space where Gaston took me periodically to beat me in an attempt to break me, although he claimed his intention was to bend me to Richard’s will.

  The next level held more cells, where the other agents who’d been kidnapped had been confined, as well as Max’s quarters and the matchbox in which he hid Browne, the sole WBIS agent to survive the ordeal.

  There was nothing—no one—on any of the other floors, so I made my back to the first floor.

  I exited the stairwell and hoped Mother hadn’t run into any difficulties.

  I’d barely taken two steps when I heard a pistol being cocked behind me and then, “You’re the last person I expected to see here, M. Mann, but I must say I’m not really surprised.”

  I recognized that voice, even though I’d only heard it once before. “Femme.” Goddammit! Where had she come from? I eased my hand out of my pocket, raised both of them to show I wasn’t armed, and turned to face her. She wore sensible shoes, a nondescript skirt suit, and the ugliest pair of eyeglasses I had ever seen. “Where’s Mark?”

  “He’s gone to the Division. Pierre is with him, as is Homme.”

  “Just the three of them?”

  She raised an eyebrow. “You don’t think those three can handle whatever Robert Lynx might throw at them?” I raised an eyebrow of my own, and she blinked and conceded, “A number of other operatives are assisting in the mission.”

  “Including Reuben?” I noticed she hadn’t mentioned the Division’s chief munitions operative, who was also de Becque’s lover. I couldn’t say I was surprised to learn he’d accompanied de Becque when the cold operative had walked away from the Division.

  “Reuben was taken by the Division. Needless to say, de Becque didn’t look upon that too kindly.”

  “So he went riding to the rescue? De Becque never struck me as that sort.”

  “His relationship with Reuben is what it is, but if he can take down the Division in the process, he’ll play the white knight.”

  There was movement behind Femme. I shifted my stance to keep her from becoming aware we were no longer
alone, and made sure my gaze remained steady on her. “May I ask why you remained behind?”

  “Someone needed to—”

  At that point, Mother interrupted her. “My dear, I do hope you don’t plan to use that pretty little weapon of yours on my son. I should truly dislike shooting you in the back—without doubt a disreputable action—however, never doubt I would.”

  Femme glanced over her shoulder and froze at the sight of Mother’s Smith & Wesson aiming for a killshot. I wasn’t tempted to laugh at Femme’s look of disgruntlement; Mother hadn’t raised foolish children.

  I slipped my Llama Mini-Max from my pocket and held it at the ready.

  Femme quickly recovered and said coolly, “Mme. Mann. Of course I’ve been hoping to encounter you one day. I just didn’t anticipate it being today.”

  “Really? Why would that be?”

  “You’ve led a fascinating life.”

  “I? All I’ve done is raise my son and run a few charities.” Mother’s tone was cool and disinterested.

  “Of course that’s all you’ve done.” Femme’s tone matched Mother’s.

  Footsteps pounded down the corridor before Mother could respond to that.

  “Femme! Be careful! Mann’s here with....” Babineaux, the former Division computer whiz, skidded to a halt and took in the scenario before him in dismay.

  Mother kept her gun trained on Femme while I aimed mine at Babineaux. His eyes grew huge as he stared down the barrel of my gun.

  “I’m aware, Babineaux,” Femme said drily.

  “Well, hell.” He cleared his throat. “What... uh...what do we do now?”

  “All I want to know is the location of the Division,” I said.

  Babineaux narrowed his eyes. “Why?”

  “I want to find Mark Vincent.”

  “Why?” he asked again.

  “Because Mark...” Femme switched to Russian. “Mark means a great deal to you, doesn’t he, M. Mann? And you needn’t bother trying to obfuscate. I would hardly permit your affair with Mark to continue if I thought there was anything less than sincere affection between the two of you.”

  “Y’know, if you didn’t want me to understand what you were saying, you could have just asked me to leave, Femme,” Babineaux complained.

  I ignored him and gave Femme a flat stare. “What is between Mark and myself has nothing to do with anyone other than the two of us,” I replied, also in Russian. “Now either tell me where I can find the Division, or I’ll find it myself. But be assured that once I do, I’ll return here and level this building and any who remain within it.”

  “Very well,” Femme agreed—more readily than I’d expected. She reverted back to English. “Babineaux, I will take M. Mann to the Division.”

  “Femme....” Babineaux looked nervous.

  “Mme. Mann will remain here.” She met my cold gaze with one equally frigid. “You see, I know how much your mother means to you.”

  “Just remember how much my son means to me, Zhenshchina.” It was the woman who’d deciphered Russian codes who spoke, and icicles dripped from each word. “If for any reason he does not return safely—if he has so much as a broken fingernail—I will be the one leveling this building.”

  Babineaux swallowed and gave a half-hearted smile. Femme nodded. After she put her gun away, Mother did the same.

  “Mother—”

  “Go, Quinton. There’s no need to worry about me.”

  Rather than return my clutch piece to its ankle holster, I slipped it back into my jacket pocket. Then I went to her and hugged her. “Please stay safe,” I whispered in her ear.

  “And you also.” She pressed her palm to my cheek. “Now, go find Mark.”

  I stared at the smoking ruin of the façade of the building and felt my stomach roll over. The remains of a wrecked car were accordioned against it. Broken glass and shattered brick littered the sidewalk and a good portion of the street.

  “This is where the Division is housed? Jesus, what happened?”

  “De Becque had the car filled with plastique and driven into the building.”

  “Jesus,” I said again. It was a wonder the building was still standing. “Is it a good idea for us to enter this way?” The police had lined up to form a barricade to prevent onlookers from approaching too closely.

  “Don’t worry about the police judiciaire interfering with us. They’re our operatives. This was de Becque’s plan.”

  “Blowing up the building?” I frowned. It didn’t say much for his mentality. And if it got Mark injured, I’d erase everyone involved with extreme prejudice. “What an idiotic—”

  “Still, it’s what caused the distraction that got them in.”

  “How do you know that?”

  She took out her cell phone, activated a program, and handed it to me. Something about it looked familiar—I had a similar program on my phone which I’d found after Mark had fiddled with it one weekend.

  “What am I looking at?”

  “This links me to Homme. He let me know they made it into the cellars of the antique shop on rue de Navarin, and from there into the Division.”

  “So that was how they got in.” I gave her back the phone, took mine from my pocket, and found what I was looking for. I’d known it was some sort of GPS program, but that Mark would want to be that securely connected to me gave me a warm feeling in my chest.

  “Yes.” She studied the readout on her phone for a second, before swearing and stalking toward the door that hung on its hinges. “Those fools!” she snarled. “They’ve gone down to the subbasement.”

  “Then that’s where we’re going.” A red heart, which I assumed represented Mark’s cell phone, pulsed deep in the bowels of the Division. I raised my gaze to Femme’s.

  The look she spared me was unfriendly. “Of course. Louis, respirators!” She showed me her phone. On the screen was a text message I would have preferred not to read: Use caution! Tactics threatens to flood the Dungeon with CO. “Tactics” was how Robert Lynx was referred to within the Division.

  “Can we trust who sent that message?” I knew it wasn’t Mark. He wouldn’t have used the name “Tactics,” and in fact would have sneered at such a juvenile appellation.

  She nodded. “It’s Homme. I have to get down there immediately.”

  “The Division has a dungeon in its building?”

  “No, I have a Dungeon.” Just from the way she said it, I could understand why Homme capitalized the word. “It’s where I do my best work. Louis, are you waiting for an engraved invitation?”

  “Pardon, Femme.”

  He ducked into a cruiser and returned with two half mask respirators. He held them out to Femme, letting them dangle from their straps. His face had a greenish cast, and I knew, given his line of work, he wasn’t frightened by the situation.

  Muttering Russian profanities, Femme took both respirators and tossed one to me. She sent an impatient glance toward the “police,” and they let us by without her having to say a word.

  She put on her respirator, waited while I slipped mine over my head and tightened the strap, and then we angled our way past the door.

  “You’ll let me go first, and you will not argue with me.” Her words were muffled by the respirator. She nodded in approval as if I’d agreed. Well, all I wanted was to get Mark out of this hellhole, preferably in one piece. Whatever Femme’s agenda, it made no difference to me.

  I took my Llama Mini-Max from my pocket and kept one eye on the debris on the floor and the other on Femme.

  Twenty feet beyond the front door, we came across the first body, twisted and bloody, charred beyond recognition. It must have been flung there when the car smashed into the building and detonated.

  I stared down at the remains, but as on the night Mark’s apartment had exploded and I’d gone to the morgue to identify the body that had been taken there, this one was too short.

  “M. Mann?”

  I shook my head. “You said you wanted to go first.” All that m
attered to me was it wasn’t Mark.

  She turned without saying another word. I spared a final glance at the dead operative, and then followed Femme to the stairwell. It wouldn’t be a good idea to use the elevators at this point.

  The smell hit us as soon as we opened the door—cordite, and blood and human waste, the odor of death. We exchanged glances, and I tightened my grip on my weapon and began descending, stepping over bodies sprawled across steps and over landings and trying to avoid puddles of blood, trails of intestines, and spatters of brain matter.

  “If he’s gotten himself killed,” Femme muttered, “I will kill him again.”

  I knew she wasn’t referring to Mark, but I felt the same. I’d given Mark strict instructions that he wasn’t to die, and if he did....

  “Homme is this way.” She started to go left.

  “Mark’s this way.” I went right. “You do what you have to do.”

  She swore in Russian, but I kept going.

  “Femme!”

  I glanced over my shoulder to see de Becque carrying the limp body of Reuben with the aid of a man of average height who looked vaguely familiar. Then I placed him. Last spring, at the Division—he and Femme had entered the elevator I was in, and Femme had proceeded to give me an oblique warning not to screw with Mark Vincent.

  Her warning hadn’t been necessary: I’d had no intention of doing so, not the way she meant, at any rate.

  I turned my attention back to Reuben. The last time I’d seen the Division’s chief munitions operative had also been last spring, but now he looked nothing like the vital man who’d ordered de Becque to get his French ass in gear or he would pound it.

  “How much time do we have before this level is flooded with carbon monoxide?” Femme hurried to them, lifted one of Reuben’s eyelids, then stepped adroitly out of the way as he vomited.

  “I disconnected the CO switch,” Homme told her. Neither he nor de Becque were out of breath, in spite of the dead weight they transported. “That’s one less thing we need to worry about.”

  “Good man.” Femme didn’t notice his pleased flush. “I’m assuming Reuben wasn’t so fortunate. Where was he?”