“Go on.”
“Whatever you think is going on at the moment, you’re wrong. Someone wants you dead.” As an information source he seemed a little after the fact.
“So I gather,” said JJ flippantly.
The American came back at him, hesitant but determined to make a distinction. “No, you don’t. This isn’t panic, this isn’t the fallout of something else. Someone wants you dead, you specifically, just like they want me dead. There’s no sitting this one out. You and I, we’re both marked.”
JJ didn’t know who he was, but he sounded like someone who knew his time was up, clutching at anything that might save him, hoping to convince someone like JJ to come in on his own protection. It was definitely intriguing though, how he knew about him in the first place, how he knew about the Bostridge hit, why he’d chosen it as an identifying device.
“Okay, Holden,” said JJ, businesslike but relaxed, “how about some meat on these bones? Who are you, who do you work for, why the concern for my welfare?”
The reply was determined again. “It doesn’t matter who I am. I called you because you can help me stay alive and I have the information you need to do the same.” His tone shifted, becoming instructional. “Now, I’m on the move and I’ll be secure by tomorrow morning our time. You have an American friend in London. Tell him I’ve gone to ground and there’s nowhere to swim. He’ll know where I am.”
He was talking about Tom Furst, a CIA contact JJ hadn’t spoken to in a year. So maybe that explained who Holden was too, and the way things looked at the moment he was probably safer playing with the CIA than anyone else, but the way things looked at the moment that probably didn’t count for much either. And if this was too devious or too flaky to be a trap, it still had a smell about it, the smell of someone knowing too much about him.
He thought of Danny urging him to treat it like a holiday, being right too about not coming back to Geneva. The previous afternoon he hadn’t felt like he needed a holiday, but it was tempting now, the urge to escape everything he was having to deal with all of a sudden, the intrigue not enough of a lure on its own to hold him back; if he’d wanted intrigue he’d have become a spy.
“I’m sorry, Holden. You may well be right, but I’d rather take the odds. And speaking of which, they’re getting shorter every minute I stay on the phone.” There was another pause before Holden answered. JJ finally realized they weren’t pauses at all but the satellite delay, and when Holden spoke he sounded calm, confident.
“I understand your caution, Mr. Hoffman. But I can assure you, your chances of surviving without my help are negligible.”
JJ felt insulted somehow, like Holden had slighted his abilities, abilities he didn’t necessarily think came to much but that he felt the need to defend anyway, particularly with two bodies in his bedroom. “Perhaps you underestimate me. The fact I’m taking this call—”
Holden cut in abruptly, the interruption arriving a few words after he’d made it. “No, I know exactly how good you are. Perhaps you underestimate me, and what you’re up against.” It was a piece of bait JJ couldn’t resist: to find out who this person was who was trying to kill him. Him specifically.
“And what am I up against? Who is it?”
“It’s Berg.” A tinny electronic echo bounced around in the earplece: Berg.
Taken aback, JJ produced a knee-jerk derisive laugh and repeated himself from a few minutes before. “Berg’s dead. And even if he wasn’t, why would he want me dead?”
But he had no choice now other than to start believing. Two people pointing a finger in the same direction was too much of a coincidence. So maybe Berg was still alive, and maybe the purge Danny had talked about was just a cover for something smaller, more personal. He still couldn’t think though why Berg would want him dead, and as if to back up that doubt Holden answered cagily, “I’m still piecing that together. Believe me though, Berg’s alive.”
Possibly he was, but there was nothing more JJ could say, and conscious suddenly of how long he’d been on the phone and of the taxi waiting outside, conscious too of giving his thoughts away, he said, “Okay, I have to go. I need to think this over for a few days. Then I’ll decide what to do.”
There was the pause again, seeming significant but meaning nothing, before Holden replied, “I hope you have a few days.”
“Thanks for your concern. Maybe I’ll be in touch.” He put the phone down and without stopping to think got the bag from the bedroom and headed down to the taxi.