Ian kept edging his way forward. He couldn’t tell if Frizzy was following. This foray into Oxford Circus had turned crazy and all he wanted was to leave.
He found the exit and started up the tiled passage.
Few people were there, most still lingering on the platform. He heard whistles ahead and quickly stepped aside as two coppers raced by him on the way down. He didn’t yet know what he’d managed to snare from the pocket before the man flew off the platform, so he took a moment to study the object.
A computer flash drive.
He shook his head. Worthless. Dinner would have to be found in one of the free missions tonight. And he’d so been looking forward to pizza.
He stuffed the drive into his pocket and rushed for the escalator. At the top he passed through the turnstile using a travel card he’d pilfered earlier from a man in Chelsea. He pushed through dingy glass doors and emerged on the sidewalk into a steady drizzle. Chilly air forced him to zip his jacket and plunge both hands into his pockets. He’d lost his gloves two days ago somewhere on the East End. He hustled down the crowded sidewalk and turned the corner, passing newspaper vendors and cigarette booths, his eyes on the uneven pavement.
“There you are. I’ve been looking for you,” a friendly voice said.
He glanced up as Frizzy casually wrapped an arm around his shoulders and diverted him toward a car beside the curb. The tip of a knife blade came beneath his jacket and pressed sharp against the soft flesh of his thigh.
“Nice and quiet,” the man whispered, “or we’ll see how you bleed.”
Three steps and they reached the open rear door of a dark-colored Bentley. He was shoved inside and Frizzy climbed in, sitting across from him in a facing rear seat.
The door shut and the car wheeled from the curb.
Ian kept his hands inside his jacket pockets and sat rigid.
His attention focused on the other man sitting beside Frizzy. Older, wearing a charcoal-gray suit with a waistcoat. He sat straight and stared at Ian through a pair of green eyes flecked with specks of brown that seemed to say that he was not somebody accustomed to disagreement. A thick fleece of white hair covered his head and spilled down onto a creased brow.
“You have something I want,” the older man said in a low, throaty voice, the words perfectly formed.
“I don’t do business with people I don’t know.”
The aloof stare of an aristocrat dissolved into a mirthful grin. “I don’t do business with street urchins. Give me the drive.”
“What’s so important about it?”
“I don’t explain myself, either.”
A cold bead of sweat slid down his back. Something about the two men who faced him signaled desperation.
And that he didn’t like.
So he lied. “I threw it away.”
“Petty thieves, like you, throw nothing away.”
“I don’t keep junk.”
“Kill him,” the older man said.
Frizzy lunged forward, the knife drawn back, ready to thrust.
“Okay. Okay,” Ian said. “I have it.”
The older man’s right hand halted Frizzy’s attack.
The Bentley started to brake in traffic.
Other vehicles could be seen outside the moisture-laden windows slowing for a road signal apparently ahead. Rush hour in London, and nobody moved fast. He quickly reviewed his options and determined they were limited. Frizzy still held the knife and kept a close watch. The other man was equally attentive, and the confines of the car did not allow much room to maneuver.
He withdrew his left hand and displayed the drive. “This what you want?”
“There’s a good boy,” the older man said.
Then Ian’s right hand telegraphed the next move, and he almost smiled.
His fingers curled around the pepper spray. He’d thought it useless. Now it was priceless.
The older man reached for the drive.
Ian whipped out his right hand and sprayed.
Both men howled, pawing their eyes in a vain attempt to relieve the pain.
“Kill him, now,” the older man ordered.
Frizzy, eyes closed, dropped the knife and reached beneath his coat.
A gun came into view.
Ian sprayed again.
Frizzy yelled.
Ian unlatched the door nearest to him and slid out onto wet pavement between two idling cars. Before slamming the door shut, he snatched the knife from the floorboard then sprang to his feet.
A woman in an adjacent vehicle gave him a queer look.
But he ignored her.
He wove a path around the congealed traffic, found the sidewalk, and disappeared into the gloomy evening.
MALONE LISTENED TO THE BOY’S STORY.
“So you were there stealing.”
“I lifted a few things. Then I took the drive off the bloke, just before the bugger pushed him into the train.”
“You saw the guy pushed?”
Ian nodded. “I wasn’t expecting that, so I ran, but ended up getting caught by the man who pushed him, then shoved into a Bentley.”
He held up the plastic bag and asked again, “Where’s the flash drive?”
“I kept it, after I left the car. I thought it could be worth something.”
“And thieves like you don’t throw away things that are worth something.”
“I’m not a thief.”
His patience was running out. “Where’s the damn drive?”
“In my special place. Where I keep my stuff.”
His phone rang.
Which startled him.
Then he realized it could be Gary. He shoved Ian into the mews and dared the boy to make a run for it.
He found the phone and clicked it on. “Gary?”
“We have your son,” the voice said, which he recognized.
Devene.
“You know what we want.”
And he was staring straight at it. “I have Dunne.”
“Then we can trade.”
He was fed up, so he said, “When and where?”
Nine
ANTRIM YANKED UP THE COLLAR OF HIS COAT AND BRACED himself for the chilly rain. The man he was following into the lousy night had just killed an American intelligence operative. He had to know who was behind this and why.