The Final Twist, Jeffery Deaver [philippa perry book TXT] 📗

All three wore dark green jogging outfits and blue latex gloves.

A driver, whom Shaw could see only in silhouette, remained behind the wheel.

As Russell and Matt kept an eye on the side street, hands near their hips, Ty and Tricia—introduced now as Karin—stepped quickly to Blond’s corpse.

Shaw said, “There’re two other security people from the library. White. One heavy, one thin. Both armed. In dark suits, and—”

Karin said, “We know. They’re in the parking garage on Harrison, picking up wheels. We have two minutes before they’re here.”

The phony attacker unfurled a body bag and he and Karin got to work with Blond. Soon the body was inside, zipped up tight.

“One, two . . . lift,” the man said. The pair grunted simultaneously and hefted the weighty bag by the handles and began shuffling back to the van. Shaw thought about asking if they needed help but they didn’t seem to. They were both quite strong, and—it appeared—had done this before. They got the bag to the van and muscled it inside.

Matt reached into the van and removed a broom and a spray bottle. He returned to the site of the shooting and spritzed liquid onto the bloodstain. The bullet would have been a hollow point, designed to expand in the brain, causing instantaneous lethal damage but remaining within the skull. Exit wounds created the biggest leaks.

He slipped the bottle into his slacks pocket and swept dirt and gravel over where the body had lain. This had some sort of procedural precision to it and was done to confound a crime scene crew, though Shaw doubted any police would ever investigate. Certainly Droon and Braxton would not be calling 911 to report that the BlackBridge employee had met his end.

“Give her the SIG.”

Shaw withdrew the weapon and handed it to Karin grip first. She removed the magazine and the round in the chamber. She locked the slide back and then deposited the gun, the mag and the solo slug in a thick plastic bag. She put what seemed to be a damp cloth inside and sealed it up.

“My prints are on it,” Shaw told her.

A faint, amused squint. Meaning: They won’t be for long. Shaw wondered what the magic material was.

Broad Ty said, “Behind us. Hostiles.”

An SUV was speeding toward them. Shaw could not see through the glary windshield but he supposed that Droon had been picked up by the two black-suited security guards earlier than he’d originally anticipated. The vehicle skidded to a stop and all three got out. They were trotting forward, cautiously, hands inside their jackets.

Russell nodded to Matt, who replaced the broom with an H&K submachine gun, mounted with a silencer. The man pulled the slide to chamber a round. He aimed toward Droon, who, with the others, fanned out, seeking cover behind trashcans.

Russell said, “No personnel. Vehicle only.”

A muted chain saw of firing, and the slugs shredded the vehicle’s grill. He’d been careful to group the rounds so that they didn’t spill past the car and endanger anyone in the park.

Matt then joined the others, who were already in the van. Shaw slid the side door shut. He noted that it was particularly heavy and wondered if the panel was bulletproof. The vehicle’s tires squealed loudly as the male driver, lean and dark-complected, steered, skidding, into the side street, away from the alley and the smoking SUV, and accelerated fast. Shaw held on tight. Russell made his way to the front passenger seat. Shaw and those in the back were benched against the wall. Matt was looking over a tablet. “No activity. We’re good.”

Russell said, “First his bike. Then the safe house on Alvarez.”

I understand. You have questions . . .

An understatement, if ever there was one.

15

How’d you place me at the library? From the air?”

There were so many questions to ask. Shaw wondered why he led with one of the least significant.

The two of them were alone in the safe house’s dining room, illuminated with an ethereal glow from the windows, as the sunlight knuckled away the pale pastel fog. They sat at a maple table, dinged and scraped, a wedge under one leg for stability.

Reading a text or email on his phone, Russell said absently, “Use drones some. Not in cities usually. FAA and Homeland Security’re problems.”

“That right?”

His older brother seemed to be debating what to say and what he shouldn’t. “Mostly, we had you on traffic and security cams. Algorithms. Handoffs.” A shrug. Meaning he didn’t want to—or legally couldn’t—be more specific.

Russell finished sending a message and rose and looked out the bay window in the front of the living room. Then he moved to the side windows and examined the view from there. It was limited. They admitted light only, as they faced a solid brick wall about ten feet away. Russell made a circuit to the back, where another bay overlooked the small garden, the alley and, beyond, an apartment that resembled Soviet-era housing. Shaw realized that there were no windows in any adjoining buildings—front, side or back—that faced the safe house. This would be one of the reasons why their father had selected it.

Shaw walked to the front window and peered outside. He could see quiet Alvarez Street and the burnt-down building across the way, the site of Tricia’s, well, Karin’s, supposed attack. He reflected that it was surprising no one had bought the lot and constructed residential property. The Mission was vastly popular and developers could make a killing. Then again, could was the operative word; San Francisco was a pressure cooker of a real estate market. You could go bust as fast as you could make ten-figure profits.

Shaw’s eyes moved from the building to the streets nearby. He was scanning both for BlackBridge ops, despite Russell’s associate’s reassurance they were clear, and for the Honda, his tail.

His brother returned to the table. The stocking cap was off