The Games (Private #11)(68)

Dr. Castro took a shower. He shaved and dressed in dull gray pants with a belt that featured a figure-eight buckle that was really the handle of a three-inch dagger that slid and locked into a hidden sheath. He’d taken it in trade for stitching up the son of a gangster but had never had any use for it until now.

After putting on a gray work shirt with collar and cuffs, Castro set a gray ball cap on his head and eased on a pair of wraparound sunglasses. He picked up the pack, threw it over one shoulder, took one last look at his laboratory, and left, locking the place up tight.

After engaging the dead bolts on the outer door, he put the pack in the trunk of his car. With the keys he’d taken from Leah, he opened her car, started it, and drove it several blocks away. He left her cell phone on and placed it under the seat.

Castro ran back, got in his car, and pulled away. It was 8:15 a.m. He was behind his original timetable by fifteen minutes.





Chapter 83

Friday, August 5, 2016

10:30 a.m.

Eight and a Half Hours Before the Olympic Games Open



SOMEONE KNOCKED SHARPLY at the door to my suite. I opened my eyes a crack, feeling more rested than I had in days. Then the night before and the heartache returned, and I realized that for a long time to come, sleep would be my only refuge from the nightmare of being awake.

Tavia, my lover, my friend, was gone. The woman who might have become my wife was gone. It felt like someone had torn something out of me by the roots.

The knock again.

“Coming,” I said. I threw on a robe, went to the door, and peered through the peephole.

Justine Smith stood there, and my heart instantly felt better.

I opened the door, smiled wanly as she said, “Oh, Jack, I’m so sorry.”

“Yeah,” I said, and held out my arms. She came into them and the door swung shut.

“I know how much Tavia meant to you,” Justine said. “I got on a plane as soon as I heard, came straight here from the airport.”

All the emotions I’d kept bottled inside broke through, and I held on to one of the few women I’ve loved in life while I went to pieces over the loss of another. Justine held on and on, exuding deep and sincere empathy, rubbing my back while I mourned.

When it was out of me, I felt wrung out and embarrassed.

Justine put her hand on my cheek, gazed into my tortured eyes, and said, “I am here for you.”

I reached and held her hand there, said, “You’re a good friend, the best.”

“Keep remembering that.”

“I could never forget,” I said, and I hugged her just for being there.

Then my cell phone rang. Justine pulled back, smiling sympathetically.

“Let it ring,” I said. “Hungry?”

“Famished,” she said. “Let’s order room service and talk about Tavia?”

The old me would have dismissed that out of hand. My inability to open up was what had ultimately done in my romantic relationship with Justine. But I had to talk about Tavia. I had to tell someone about the love I’d lost.

“I’d like that,” I said.

“Good,” she said. “I’ll order. You get showered and dressed.”

I gave her a mock salute and headed to the bathroom, thinking once again how great Justine was. Goddamn it, even though I’d blown it with her and even though she was with someone else now, Justine still had the purest heart of anyone I’d ever met. Just having her to rely on made the burden of Tavia’s death seem almost bearable.

I climbed out of the shower and was dressing when my cell phone began to ring again. I looked at the caller ID and answered.

“General da Silva?”

“There’s a good chance I will be fired today,” he said stiffly. “Getting a police helicopter and several men shot out of the sky in full view of many of the Olympic venues evidently does not sit well with the president.”

“I imagine it wouldn’t,” I said.

“If I am relieved of command, you’ll continue on?”

“In any role the government wants,” I promised.

“I appreciate it, and I can’t say how sorry I am about Tavia. She was one of a kind, a special person, and the only woman I have ever truly feared.”

I laughed at that, said, “She could be fierce at times. That’s one of the things I loved about her.” Then my laugh turned wistful and died.

“I’ll be in touch once I know,” da Silva said.

“I’ll eat and then get to work.”

He hung up. Mo-bot called a minute later.

“You sleep?” she asked.

“I was going to ask you the same thing.”

“On the couch here at Private Rio,” she said.

“Seven and a half solid hours here.”

“That’s a blessing. How are you? I mean…”

“It’s tolerable as long as I don’t think about it, meaning about every minute or so I get stabbed in the gut. But Justine’s here.”

“That’s a help. Jack, you poor thing. Listen, I finally tracked down the articles of incorporation for Dr. Castro’s business. You’ll never guess what the company was organized to do.”

“Infectious-disease research?”

“How’d you guess that?”