The Bourne Objective

18


COVEN WENT ABOUT his work with a frightening calm. He had spent the hours after trussing up Chrissie and Scarlett familiarizing himself with the house. As for Chrissie’s father, he’d bound and gagged him and stuffed him in a closet. He left them for forty minutes for a trip to a hardware store, where he bought the largest portable generator he could carry by himself. Returning to the house, he checked on his captives. Chrissie and her daughter were still securely tied to the twin beds upstairs. The father was either asleep or unconscious, Coven didn’t care which. Then he had lugged the generator into the basement and with little difficulty hooked it up to the electrical system, as a backup if the lights went out. He ran a test. The thing ticked like a geriatric grandfather clock. It was severely undersize for its task. Even cutting back on the circuits he connected, he determined that he’d have a maximum of ten minutes of light before the generator conked out. Well, it would have to do.
Then he went back upstairs and stared at Chrissie and Scarlett while he smoked a cigarette. The daughter, though only a preteen, was prettier than the mother. If he were another sort of person he would avail himself of that very young, tender body, but he despised that degenerate trait in men. He was a fastidious person, a man of moral rectitude. It was how he dealt with his job, how he managed to stay sane in what he considered an insane world. His personal life was pure vanilla, as dull as a bus driver’s gray existence. He had a wife—his high school sweetheart—two children, and a dog named Ralph. He had mortgage payments, a dotty mother to support, and a brother he visited fortnightly in a loony bin, though these days they didn’t call it that. When he came home from a long, hard, often bloody assignment, he kissed his wife hard on the lips, then went to his children and—whether they were playing, sitting in front of the TV, or asleep in bed—bent over them and inhaled their milky-sweet scent. Then he ate a meal his wife had prepared, took her upstairs, and f*cked her silly.
He lit another cigarette from the end of the butt, and stared down at mother and daughter spread-eagled side by side on the twin beds. The girl was a child, inviolate. The thought of harming her was thoroughly repellent to him. As for the mother, she didn’t appeal to him, too skinny and wan looking. He’d leave her to someone else. Unless Bourne forced him to kill her.
Back downstairs, he rummaged through the larder, opened up a can of Heinz baked beans, and ate the contents cold from the backs of his two fingers. All the while he listened to the tiny sounds around him, breathed in and mentally cataloged the scents in each room. In short, he moved around the house until he’d familiarized himself with every idiosyncrasy, every nook and cranny. Now it was his territory, his high ground, his eventual place of victory.
Then he returned to the living room and switched on all the lamps. That’s when he heard the gunshot. Rising, he drew his Glock from its leather holster and, pulling back the drapes, peered out the front window. He tensed as he saw Jason Bourne zigzagging at top speed toward the front door. With a squeal of rubber and a spray of gravel, a gray Opel slewed around broadside to the front of the house. The driver’s door opened, and the driver fired a shot at Bourne. He missed. Then Bourne was on the front steps, and Coven went to the door, his Glock at the ready. He heard two more shots and, crouching down, swung the door open. Bourne was sprawled facedown on the steps, a stain of blood spreading over his jacket.
Coven ducked back as another shot was fired. He darted out even as he squeezed off one shot after another. The gunman ducked back inside the Opel. Coven grabbed Bourne’s jacket with his free hand and hauled him over the sill. He fired off one more shot, heard the gunman put the Opel into gear and speed off. He kicked the door shut behind him.
He checked Bourne’s pulse, then went to the window. Pulling aside the curtains again, he peered into the driveway but could see no sign of either the gunman or the Opel.
Turning back into the living room, he bent over to Bourne’s prone form and pressed the muzzle of the Glock to the side of Bourne’s head. He was turning him over when the lights flickered, dimmed, then came on again. From the basement, he heard the grandfather-clock ticking of the backup generator. He had scarcely enough time to register that the power to the house had been cut when Bourne knocked the Glock away and struck him a powerful blow on his sternum.
The man you’re looking for is in Puerto Pe?asco, no doubt.” Antonio handed Soraya back her cell phone. “My compadre, the marina’s harbormaster, knows the gringo. He’s taken up residence in the old Santa Teresa convent, which has been abandoned for years. He has a cigarette boat he takes out each evening just after sunset.”
They were seated in a sunny cantina on Calle de Ana Gabriela Guevara in Nogales. Antonio had spent some time helping Soraya clean up, getting her ice to use in the compress she placed against the spot between her breasts where the scorpion had stung her. The reddish patch did not swell, and whatever symptoms she had felt in the desert were now mostly gone. She also had Antonio buy her half a dozen bottles of water, which she started drinking right away to fight her dehydration and more quickly move the venom out of her system.
After an hour or so, she felt better. Then she bought new clothes in a store on Plaza Kennedy, and they went to get something to eat.
“I’ll drive you to Puerto Pe?asco,” Antonio said.
Soraya popped the last bite of her chilaquiles into her mouth. “I think you have better things to do. You’re no longer making money off me.”
Antonio made a face. On the ride back into Nogales he had told her his real name was Antonio Jardines. He’d taken Contreras as his business name. “Now you offend me. Is this how you treat the man who saved your life?”
“I owe you a debt of thanks.” Soraya sat back, contemplating him. “What I can’t understand is why you’re taking such a personal interest in me.”
“How to explain?” Antonio sipped his café de olla. “My life is defined by the space between Nogales, Arizona, and here, in Nogales, Sonora. A f*cking boring strip of desert that’s been known to drive men like me to drink. My only concern is the f*cking migras and, believe me, that’s not much of anything.” He spread his hands. “There’s something else, too. Life here is full of neglect. In fact, you could say that life here is defined by neglect, the kind that rots the soul and infests all of Latin America. No one gives a shit—about anyone, or anything, except money.” He finished off his café de olla. “Then you come along.”
Soraya considered this. She took her time because she didn’t want to make a mistake, although she could hardly be certain of anything here. “I don’t want to drive into Puerto Pe?asco,” she said finally. She had been thinking about this all through the meal. Antonio finding out that Arkadin had a cigarette sealed the deal. “I want to arrive there by boat.”
Antonio’s eyes glittered. Then his forefinger made a bobbing motion. “This is what I’m talking about. You don’t think like a woman, you think like a man. This is what I would do.”
“Can your compadre at the marina arrange it?”
He chuckled. “You see, you do need my help.”
* * *
Bourne struck a second blow. He had been shot with blanks by Ottavio Moreno and was covered in pig’s blood from a plastic bag he’d punctured. Coven, who didn’t react one way or another to the blows, drove the butt of the Glock down onto Bourne’s forehead. Bourne grabbed his wrist and twisted hard. Then he caught one of Coven’s fingers and broke it. The Glock went flying across the living room floor, fetching up beside the cold grate.
Bourne pushed Coven off and rose on one knee, but Coven kicked his leg out from under him and Bourne toppled backward. Coven was on him in an instant, driving his fist into Bourne’s face, landing blow after blow. Bourne lay still. Coven rose and aimed a kick at Bourne’s ribs. Without seeming to move at all, Bourne caught his foot before it could land and wrenched the ankle to the left.
Coven grunted as the anklebones snapped. He landed hard, immediately rolled over, and scrambled on elbows and knees toward where the Glock lay beside the grate.
Bourne took up a brass sculpture from a chair-side table and threw it. The sculpture slammed into the back of Coven’s head, driving his chin and nose into the floor. His jaws snapped shut and blood gushed from his nose. Undeterred, he grabbed the Glock and, in one fluid motion, swung it around and squeezed off a shot. The bullet struck the table beside Bourne’s head, toppling it and the lamp on it onto Bourne.
He tried to fire again, but Bourne leapt on him, wrestling him onto his back. He grabbed a fire poker and swung it down hard. Bourne rolled away and the poker bounced against the floor. Coven stabbed out with it, catching Bourne’s jacket, piercing it and pinning him to the floor. He rammed the end of the poker into the wood, then rose painfully over Bourne. Taking up the ash shovel, he brought the long brass handle across Bourne’s throat and, using all his weight, pressed down.
* * *
It was 123 miles from Nogales to Las Conchas, where an associate of Antonio’s compadre had driven the boat they would pick up. She had asked for a big boat, and an ostentatious one, something to catch Arkadin’s attention and keep it until he got a good look at her. In the Nogales Mall, before they had set out, she had bought the most provocative bikini she could find. When she’d modeled it for Antonio, his eyes almost popped out of his skull.
“?Madre de Dios, qué linda muchacha!” he had cried.
Because of the aftereffect of the scorpion sting, she bought a diaphanous cover-up, also some beach towels, a pair of huge Dior sunglasses, a fashionable visor, and a fistful of sunscreen, which she lost no time in slathering on.
Antonio’s friend was named Ramos, and he had brought exactly the right kind of boat: big and flashy. Its diesels thrummed and gurgled as she and Antonio boarded and were shown around below by Ramos. He was a small, dark, rotund man, with curling black hair, tattoos on his massive arms, and a ready smile.
“I have guns—pistols and semi-automatics—if you need them,” he said helpfully. “No extra charge, except for spent rounds.”
Soraya thanked him, but said weapons wouldn’t be necessary.
Soon after returning above deck they got under way. Puerto Pe?asco was just over five miles due north.
Over the rumble of the diesels, Ramos said, “We have a couple of hours before sunset, when Arkadin usually takes out the cigarette. I have fishing gear. I’ll take you to the fifty-one-mile reef, where there’s plenty of halibut, black sea bass, and red snapper. How about it?”
Soraya and Antonio fished off the reef for about an hour and a half before they packed it in and swept in toward the marina. Ramos pointed out Arkadin’s cigarette as he cut the speed rounding the headland and nosed in toward the docks. There was no sign of Arkadin, but Soraya could see an older Mexican preparing the boat to get under way. The Mexican was dark-skinned, with a face fissured by hard work, salt wind, and scorching sunlight.
“You’re in luck,” Ramos said. “He’s coming.”
Soraya looked in the direction Ramos indicated and saw a powerful-looking man striding down the dock. He wore a baseball cap, black-and-green surfer’s bathing trunks, a torn Dos Equis T-shirt, and a pair of rubber sandals. She slipped off her cover-up. Her dark, oiled skin gleamed sleekly.
The dock was long, jutting out into the marina, and she had time to study him. He had dark hair, cut very short, a rugged face that gave away nothing, very square shoulders, like a swimmer, but his arms and legs were more like a wrestler’s, long and muscular. He looked as if he had every reason to be confident, walking with a minimum amount of effort, almost gliding, as if his feet were made of ball bearings. There was a source of energy about him, like a ring of fire, that she could not comprehend, but it made her uneasy. She thought there was something familiar about him, which made her unease almost painful. And then, with an electric jolt that frightened her to her core, she knew what it was: He moved just like Jason.
“Here we go.” Ramos steered the boat in front of the cigarette and put it in idle so that they drifted in toward the slip.
Arkadin was saying something to the Mexican and laughing when Ramos’s boat caught the periphery of his vision. He looked up, squinting against the oblique sunlight, and at once saw Soraya. His nostrils flared as his gaze took in her aggressive, exotic face, her body, which in the tiny bikini was as good as being naked—even better, Soraya felt, because it left the tiniest bit to his imagination. She raised one arm, as if to keep her visor on her head, but really the gesture accentuated the sensuality of her body.
And then, just like that, he turned away and said something to the Mexican that made him chuckle. Soraya was disappointed. Her fingers gripped the railing as if she wanted to throttle it.
“The gringo’s a f*cking maricón, that’s all there is to it,” Antonio said.
Soraya laughed. “Don’t be idiotic.” But his comment had lifted her out of her temporary sense of defeat. “I haven’t given him enough of a challenge.” Then an idea occurred to her and, turning to Antonio, she put her arms on his shoulders. Gazing into his eyes, she said, “Kiss me. Kiss me and don’t stop.”
Antonio looked happy to oblige. He grabbed her around the waist and planted his lips on hers. His tongue seemed to scald her as it probed between her teeth and into her mouth. Soraya arched her back, molding her body to his.
Ramos maneuvered the boat a bit too close to the cigarette’s bow, causing the gringo and El Heraldo to turn. As El Heraldo ran to the bow, gesticulating and cursing him mightily, the gringo stood watching Soraya and Antonio locked in their amorous embrace. He seemed interested now.
Shouting his apologies, Ramos steered the boat back on course and eased it into its slip. A marina hand stood by to loop the mooring ropes fore and aft as Ramos cut the engines, and threw the coils to him. Then Ramos stepped off the boat and headed toward the harbormaster’s office. Arkadin continued to stare at Soraya and Antonio Jardines, though he hadn’t moved an inch.
“Enough,” Soraya said into Antonio’s mouth. “?Basta, hombre! ?Basta!”
Antonio was reluctant to let her go, and she pushed him away first with one hand, then with both. By the time she had managed to free herself, Arkadin was on the dock, heading their way.
“Mano, you’re like a f*cking pulpo,” she said loudly, only partly for Arkadin’s benefit.
Antonio, relishing his role, grinned at her and wiped his lips with the back of his hand. Then Arkadin was on board and between them.
“Maricón, what are you doing here? Get out of my face,” Antonio said.
Arkadin straight-armed him off the boat and into the water. The Mexican on the cigarette laughed uproariously.
“That wasn’t a good idea,” Soraya said coldly.
“He was hurting you.” Arkadin said it as a clear statement of fact.
“You have no idea what he was doing.” Soraya kept up her frozen exterior.
“He’s a man, you’re a woman,” Arkadin said. “I know exactly what he was doing.”
“Maybe I liked it.”
Arkadin laughed. “Maybe you did. Should I help the sonovabitch back onto the dock?”
Soraya looked down at Antonio snorting water out of his nose. “I could have done that.” Then she looked back at Arkadin. “Leave the sonovabitch where he is.”
Arkadin laughed again and offered her his arm. “Maybe you need a change of scene.”
“Maybe I do. But it won’t be with you.”
Then she pushed past him, climbed off the boat, and walked slowly and provocatively back up the dock.
Bourne felt his lungs burning. There were black spots in his vision. Soon enough the bar across his throat would crack his hyoid bone, and it would be all over for him. Reaching out, he grabbed Coven’s fractured ankle and squeezed as hard as he could. Coven shouted in surprise and pain, the pressure came off Bourne’s throat as Coven reared back, and, shoving the bar upward, Bourne rolled out from under it.
Coven, a murderous look in his eye, found the Glock and aimed it at Bourne. At that moment the ticking of the generator ceased and the house was plunged into darkness. Coven squeezed off a shot, narrowly missing Bourne, and Bourne rolled away into deepest shadow. He held still for the space of ten long breaths, then rolled again. Coven fired another shot, but this struck well wide of the mark. It was clear he had no idea where Bourne was located.
Bourne could hear Coven moving around. Now that the lights had been extinguished, Coven had lost the advantage of being on his territory. Coven would have to think of another way to reestablish his dominant position.
If Bourne were in his shoes, he’d try to get to Chrissie and Scarlett, use them as leverage to flush him out. He stayed very still, listening intently to the direction in which Coven was moving. It was from left to right. He was passing the fireplace. Where was he headed? Where was he keeping his captives?
Bourne pictured as much of the ground-floor interior as had registered after Coven had dragged him inside. He could see the fireplace, the two upholstered armchairs, the side table and lamp, the sofa, and the stairs leading up to the second story.
The creak of a step tread betrayed Coven, and without a second thought Bourne sprang from his hiding place, scooped up the lamp, and jerked its cord out of the electrical socket. He threw it hard against the wall to his left as he leapt up onto the cushion of the armchair. Coven fired two shots in the direction of the crash as Bourne launched himself over the railing of the staircase.
He slammed into Coven, hurling him against the back wall before landing atop him. Coven, shaken, nevertheless squeezed off two more shots. He missed, but the flashes burned Bourne’s cheek. Coven lunged for Bourne, trying to swat him with the barrel of the Glock. Bourne kicked out, splintering one of the railing balusters. Wrenching it out of its socket, he swung it against the side of Coven’s face. Coven grunted as his own blood spattered the wall and he rolled away from another blow. He lashed out with his foot, slamming the sole of his shoe into Bourne’s face. Tumbling backward, Bourne fell away from him, and, bracing himself against the wall, Coven fired twice more into the confined space of the staircase.
Either of the shots would have hit Bourne had he not already vaulted over the banister. He hung there in darkness. When he heard Coven scrambling up the stairs, he flexed his arms and, rising up, rolled his body back over the banister. Taking the treads three at a time, he raced up to the second floor. He knew two things now: Coven was going for his hostages, and the Glock had run through its magazine. Coven needed time to reload and was at his most vulnerable.
But when Bourne reached the second-floor landing there was no discernible movement. He crouched and, listening, waited. More windows meant light, but it was faint and inconstant, as the overgrown tree branches outside scraped against the house. He could see four doors: four rooms, two on either side. He opened the door into the first room on the left, which was empty, put his ear against the inside wall that abutted the next room. He heard nothing. He went back to the doorway. Coven fired at him as Bourne raced across the hallway and into the first room on the right. Bourne had given him time to reload.
Wasting no time, Bourne crossed to the window, unlatched it, and, opening it wide, climbed through. He was faced with a thick tangle of oak branches into which he climbed. Moving through the oak, he made his way to the window of the second room on the right. A shadow moved in there, and he went very still. Dimly, he could make out a pair of twin beds. He thought he saw figures lying on them: Chrissie and Scarlett?
Reaching up to the branch lying more or less horizontally over his head, he swung himself back and forth to gain the required momentum, then launched himself feet-first through the window. The old glass shattered into a thousand crystalline fragments, causing Coven to instinctively cover his face with his forearm.
Landing, Bourne flew across the room, striking Coven shoulder-first. The two men slammed against the far wall and went down in a heap. Bourne punched him three times, then lunged for the Glock. But Coven was ready, and when Bourne’s defense opened up, he struck a hammer blow on his burned and bleeding cheekbone, Bourne went down, and Coven raised the Glock, not at Bourne, but at Scarlett, who lay bound and spread-eagled on the nearest bed. His angle was such that he had no clear shot at Chrissie, who lay on the bed nearer the window.
Coven was breathing heavily but still managed to say, “All right, get up. You have five seconds to put your hands behind your head. Then I shoot the girl.”
“Please, Jason, please. Do what he says.” Chrissie’s voice was high, tight with a mortal terror that bordered on hysteria. “Don’t let him hurt Scarlett.”
Bourne looked at Chrissie, then delivered a scissors kick that jerked Coven’s extended gun arm down and away from Scarlett.
Coven cursed under his breath as he struggled to regain control of the Glock. That was his mistake. Keeping the scissors grip on Coven’s arm, Bourne jackknifed his body. He head-butted Coven in his already broken and bloody nose. Coven howled in pain but still tried extricating his arm. Bourne smashed the sole of his shoe into Coven’s kneecap, shattering it. Coven collapsed, and Bourne stepped on the knee. Coven’s eyes watered and his jowls shook so hard, shivers went down his body.
Wrenching the Glock away from him, Bourne pressed its muzzle into Coven’s right eye.
When Coven tried to make a countermove, Bourne said, “If you do that, you’ll never walk out of the room. Who will take care of your wife and children then?”
Coven, his visible eye bloodshot and staring, subsided. But as Bourne removed the muzzle, he exploded upward, using his shoulder and hip. Bourne bore the attack with equanimity, allowed Coven to drive him backward, to expend whatever reserve of energy he had left, then brought the butt of the Glock down on Coven’s skull, shattering the orbital bone. Coven tried to scream, but no sound emerged from his mouth. His eyes rolled up into his head as he fell at Bourne’s feet.