“There has to be another way,” Decker said again. “What alternatives are there to trace her? It can’t be through her paintings. She never told me the name of the New York gallery she used. There are hundreds and hundreds of galleries there. Given the time pressure, it would take too long to contact every one of them. Anyway, for all I know, the gallery was a lie and Beth never sold any paintings. The only proof was the art dealer I met, Dale Hawkins, and he might not have been who Beth said he was. If only I’d thought to make a note of the license number on the car he parked outside her house. But I didn’t have a reason to be suspicious.”
When Decker looked up, Hal and Ben were watching him strangely. “Are you okay?”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re gesturing and muttering to yourself.”
“The car,” Decker said.
“Excuse me?”
“The car Hawkins was driving. That’s it!”
“What are you talking about?”
“Dale Hawkins was driving a rental.” Decker stood, excited. “When I passed the front window, I looked in and saw the envelope for the rental agreement on the front seat. I’m pretty sure it was Avis. And I’m very sure the date was September first, because that was when Beth closed the deal on her house. A blue Chevrolet Cavalier. If Dale Hawkins flew into Albuquerque as he claimed, he would have rented the car at the airport. He would have needed to show his driver’s license and a credit card. I can find out his home address.” Decker’s excitement suddenly was smothered. “Assuming Esperanza tells me what he learns from the car-rental company.”
Decker looked long and hard at Hal and Ben.
“I’m probably going to regret this,” Hal said.
“What are you talking about?”
“I guess I can wait a while to let headquarters know that what happened last night has nothing to do with business.”
“You’re going to help me?”
“Do you remember when the three of us worked together in Beirut?” Hal asked unexpectedly.
“How could I forget?”
On March 16, 1984, the Shiite terrorist group, Hizballah, had kidnapped CIA station chief William Buckley. Decker, Hal, and Ben had been part of a task force trying to find where Buckley was being held prisoner. Decker’s part in the search had lasted until September, when he had been transferred to antiterrorist activities in Germany. The intensity of those hot summer months and the determination of the task force were seared in his memory. Buckley was never located. A year later, on October 11, 1985, Hizballah announced Buckley’s death.
“Down the street from the task force headquarters, there was a little zoo,” Hal said. “Do you remember that?”
“Certainly. I don’t know how many animals the zoo had before the civil war broke out, but when we arrived, the only ones left were a leopard, a giraffe, and a bear. The bear hadn’t adjusted to the climate. It was pathetic.”
“Then a sniper from one of the factions decided to make a game of shooting at whoever went out to feed the animals. The sniper killed the caretaker. In the next two days, he popped off four volunteers. The animals began to starve.”
“I remember that, too.” Decker felt a constriction in his throat.
“One night, you disappeared. When you came back in the morning, you said you were going to take food and water out to the animals. I tried to stop you. I warned you the sniper would like nothing better than to kill an American. You told me you had taken care of the sniper. He wasn’t going to be a problem any longer. Of course, another sniper might have replaced him and shot at you, but that didn’t seem to bother you. You were determined to make sure the animals weren’t suffering.”
The courtyard became silent.
“Why did you mention that?” Decker asked.
“Because I thought about going out to track down that sniper,” Hal said. “But I never worked up the nerve. I envied you for having done what I should have. Funny, huh? Beirut was a pit of human misery, but we were worried about those three animals. Of course, it didn’t make any difference. A mortar shell killed them the next day.”
“But they didn’t die hungry,” Decker said.
“That’s right. You’re a stand-up guy. Show me where the nearest pay phone is,” Hal said. “I’ll tell headquarters we’re still looking into things. I’ll ask them to use their computer network to find out who rented a blue Chevrolet Cavalier from Avis at the Albuquerque airport on September first. There was probably more than one Cavalier. A good thing it’s not a big airport.”
“Hal?”
“What?”
“...Thanks.”
7
Decker struggled with painful emotions as he stared out the rear window of the Ford Taurus that Hal and Ben had rented when they drove up from Albuquerque earlier in the day. That seemed an eternity ago. What he saw through the car’s rear window was the diminishing vista of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, of yellowing aspen in the ski basin, of adobe houses nestled into foothills, of piñons and junipers and the crimson glow of a high-desert sunset. For the first time since he had arrived more than a year ago, he was leaving Santa Fe. Oh, he had driven out of the city limits before—to go fishing or white water rafting or on sight-seeing expeditions to Taos. But those day trips had somehow seemed an extension of Santa Fe, and after all, they had been brief, and he had known that he would soon be coming back.
Now, however, he was truly leaving—for how long he had no idea or whether he would, in fact, be coming back. Certainly, he wanted to come back, with all his heart, the sooner the better, but the issue was, would he be able to come back? Would the search upon which he had embarked create pitfalls that would prevent him from coming back? Would he survive to come back? During his numerous missions in military special operations and later as an intelligence operative, he had remained alive, in part because he had a professional’s ability to distinguish between acceptable risks and foolhardy ones. But being a professional required more than just making judgments based on training, experience, and ability. It demanded a particular attitude—a balance between commitment and objectivity. Decker had resigned from intelligence work because he no longer had the commitment and was sick of an objectivity that left him feeling detached from everything around him.
But he definitely felt committed now, more than at any time in his life. He was totally, passionately, obsessively determined to find Beth. His love for her was infinite. She was the focus of his life. He would risk anything to catch up to her.
Anything? he asked himself, and his answer was immediate. Yes. Because if he wasn’t able to find Beth, if he wasn’t able to resolve the overwhelming tensions that seized him, he wouldn’t be able to continue with anything else. His life would have no meaning. He would be lost.
As he peered morosely out the Taurus’s side window, noting how the sunset’s crimson had intensified, almost bloodred, he heard Hal in the front seat saying something, repeating his name.
“What is it?”
“Do people around here always drive this crazy, or is it just because of the holiday weekend?”
“No. Traffic’s always this crazy,” Decker said, only partly attending to the conversation.
“I thought New York and Los Angeles had terrible drivers. But I’ve never seen anything like this. They come up right behind my rear bumper at sixty-five miles an hour. I can see them in my rearview mirror, glaring at me because I’m not going eighty. They veer out into the passing lane without using their signal, then veer back into my lane, again without signaling, this time almost scraping my front bumper. Then they race ahead to crowd the next car. Sure, in New York and Los Angeles, they crowd you, too, but that’s because everybody’s in gridlock. Here, there’s plenty of space ahead and behind me, but they still crowd you. What the hell’s going on?”
Decker didn’t answer. He was peering through the back window again, noting that the foothills and adobe houses had gotten even smaller. He was beginning to feel as if he were plummeting awa
y from them. The racetrack flashed by. Then the Taurus began the climb to the peak of La Bajada hill and the start of the two-thousand-foot southward drop toward Albuquerque.
“Saturday night,” Hal said. “The guy might not be home.”
“Then I’ll wait until he comes back,” Decker said.
“We’ll all wait,” Ben said.
Emotion made it difficult for Decker to speak. “Thanks. I appreciate this.”
“But I don’t know how long I can keep stalling headquarters,” Hal said.
“You’ve already been a great help.”
“Maybe. We’ll soon find out if what I learned really does help.”
When Hal had driven to a pay phone in Santa Fe, he had requested information from his employer’s computer system. The system had covert links to every civilian data bank in the United States and with remarkable speed was able to inform Hal that while several blue Chevrolet Cavaliers served as rental cars at the Albuquerque airport, all but one had been rented prior to Thursday, September 1. The remaining Cavalier had indeed been rented on September 1, at 10:13 in the morning, but the name of the renter had not been Dale Hawkins, as Decker had hoped. Instead, the name had been Randolph Green, and his address had not been in or around New York City, as would have been the case for Dale Hawkins; rather, the address had been in Albuquerque itself.
“Randolph Green,” Hal said, driving farther from Santa Fe, almost to the crest of the hill. “Who do you suppose he is?”
“And why does a man who lives in Albuquerque go out to the airport to rent a car?” Decker turned from the diminishing crimson sunset. “That’s what makes me think we’re on the right track.”
“Or at least the only track that’s promising,” Ben said.
“But why would Beth lie about his name?” Decker shook his head. In a way, the question was naive—he already knew part of the answer. Beth had lied for the same reason she hadn’t told him she thought she was the real target of last night’s attack, for the same reason she hadn’t told him that Brian McKittrick would be waiting on Fort Connor Lane to pick her up. Throughout her relationship with me, Decker thought, she’s been hiding something. The relationship itself had been a lie.
No! he insisted. It can't have been a lie. How could anything that powerful have been a sham? Wouldn’t I have seen the deception in her eyes? Wouldn’t I have noticed hesitancy or calculation, something in her manner that would have given her away? I used to be a master of calculation. She couldn’t possibly have fooled me. The emotion she showed toward me was real, the tenderness, the passion, the caring, the ... Decker was about to use the word love when it occurred to him that he couldn’t recall an occasion when Beth had told him directly that she loved him. He had said it to her often enough. But had she ever initiated the statement or echoed it when he said it to her? Trying as hard as he could, he was unable to remember.
Other memories came readily—the first time he and Beth had made love, sinking to the brick floor of her studio, uncertain, tentative, awestruck, wanting, caressing, exploring. That, also, had been on September 1, after he had met “Dale Hawkins,” after Beth had shown Decker her paintings. An avalanche of doubting questions threatened to crush Decker’s sanity. Had Beth actually painted them? Was Beth Dwyer her true name? Was her husband in fact dead? For that matter, had she ever been married? What was her relationship with Brian McKittrick? It couldn’t possibly be a coincidence that McKittrick knew both Decker and Beth.
Madness, Decker thought. Sweat beaded on his upper lip. He felt off balance. Nothing was as it seemed. Everything he had taken for granted was called into question. He had a persistent sense of falling and almost wished that he had never resigned from intelligence work. At least, back then, he had known the rules. Deception was the norm, and he had never been fooled by the lies presented to him. Now, in his determination to believe that life didn’t have to be based on deception, he had finally been deceived.
Then why, he asked himself, did he feel so determined to catch up to Beth? To protect the woman he loved? Or was his motive the need to demand explanations from the woman who had lied to him? Confusion was the only thing about which he was certain—and the fact that for whatever reason, he would never rest until he found Beth. He would die trying.
Ben was talking to him again. “When that detective— what’s his name? Esperanza?—figures out you’ve left town, he’ll be mad as hell. He’ll have the state police looking for you.”
“For all of us,” Hal added. “He saw this rental car parked in front of Steve’s house. He can describe it.”
“Yes,” Decker said. “He’ll come looking for me.”
The Taurus crested the hill and began the long descent toward Albuquerque. As Santa Fe vanished, Decker turned to study the dark uncertainties that faced him.
SEVEN
1
After the Hispanic-pueblo design of the buildings in Santa Fe, the peaked roofs and brick or wood exteriors of the conventional structures in Albuquerque seemed unusual. While Santa Fe had a few Victorian houses, Albuquerque had many, and they, too, looked unusual to Decker, as did the even more numerous ranch houses, one of which was Randolph Green’s.
It took an hour to find the address. Decker, Hal, and Ben had to stop at three different service stations off Interstate 25 before they found one that had a map of Albuquerque. The map wasn’t as detailed as they would have liked and they had to drive slowly, watching for street signs, but they finally reached their destination in the flatlands on the west side of the city. Chama Street consisted of modest ranch houses, whose lawns, shade trees, and hedges made Decker feel as if he’d been transported into a midwestern suburb. Again he had a dizzying sense of unreality.
“That’s the address,” Hal said, driving past a house that seemed no different from any of the others.
The time was after 10:00 P.M. Sunset had ended quite a while ago. Except for widely spaced streetlights and a few illuminated windows in homes, the neighborhood was dark, residents presumably out enjoying their Saturday night Green’s house had a light on in a room at the back and on the porch.
“Maybe he’s home—maybe he isn’t,” Ben said. “Those lights might be intended to discourage burglars.”
“Drive around the block,” Decker said. “Let’s make sure there aren’t any surprises.”
There weren’t. The neighborhood appeared as perfectly ordinary as Green’s house.
“Maybe we’ve made a mistake,” Hal said. “This doesn’t exactly seem like a hotbed of danger.”
“It’s the only lead we’ve got.” Decker struggled to maintain hope. “I want to ask Green why he had to go all the way to the airport to rent a car.”
Hal parked down the street.
Decker waited until the Taurus’s headlights had been extinguished before he got out. He wanted the cover of darkness. But as he started to walk back toward Green’s house, Hal opened the trunk.
“Just a minute,” Hal told him softly, and handed him something. Decker recognized the feel of a packet of lock picks.
Then Hal handed him something else, and Decker definitely didn’t need to ask him what it was. The feel of the object was all too familiar—a semiautomatic pistol.
“Nine millimeter,” Hal said even more softly. “A Beretta. Here’s a sound suppressor for it.” Hal was taking items out of a suitcase. Ben was helping himself.
“But how did you get through airport security?”
“Didn’t need to.”
Decker nodded. “I remember now. Back at the house, you mentioned you’d used a company jet.”
“All set?” Ben asked.
After glancing around to make sure he wasn’t seen, Decker removed the pistol’s magazine, checked that it was fully loaded, replaced the magazine, and worked the slide on top of the weapon, inserting a round into the firing chamber. Carefully he lowered the pistol’s hammer, didn’t bother to engage the safety catch, and shoved the weapon under his belt, concealing it beneath a tan windbreaker tha
t he had put on along with dark sneakers, fresh jeans, and a clean denim shirt. Although he had done his best to shower off the soot in his hair and on his skin, the cold water had not done a good job. He still had a faint odor of smoke about him. “Ready.”
“How do you want to do this?” Ben asked. “If Green’s at home, he might not be by himself. He might have a family. He might be innocent. Or he might be rooming with a bunch of guys who love to sit around with automatic weapons. In either case, we can’t just barge in.”
“Watch the house from here. I’ll have a look,” Decker said.
“But you might need backup.”
“You said yourself that this isn’t business. Since this is my show, I’ll take the risk.”
“We’re not doing this for business reasons.”
“Believe me, if I need help, I’ll let you know.”
As Hal shut the trunk, Decker walked with deceptive calm along the shadowy sidewalk, warily scanning the houses on both sides of the street as he approached Green’s. No one was in sight. He passed Green’s house, turned left onto the yard of the house beyond it—that house was completely dark—and moved along a wooden fence, staying low until he reached the back. He had been concerned that there might be a dog at this house or at Green’s, but neither backyard had a doghouse, and he didn’t hear any barking. The night was still. While he worked to control his tension, he smelled the unfamiliar sweetness of new-mown grass.
The light at the back of Green’s house came from a window, sending a rectangular glow into the murky backyard. No figures moved inside the house. From Decker’s position, he had a view of the back of Green’s single-car garage. Moving slowly to minimize any slight noise he made, he climbed the waist-high fence and dropped to the opposite lawn. Immediately he pressed himself against the back of the garage, blending with shadows. When no one responded to his entry into the yard, he peered through the garage’s back window, the light at the rear of Green’s house allowing him to see that the garage was empty.