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chapter 23
Paris, France
Munroe stalked the streets, collar turned up, hands tucked deep into the pockets of the ankle-length coat she’d procured off a departing passenger at the airport.
Even in the sun, the difference between the equatorial summer night and the mild Parisian winter morning was about sixty degrees, and it would have been a relief to return to the warmth and comfort of the room she’d secured at the Park Hyatt.
She moved decisively in the direction of Place Pigalle, the city’s chic red-light district famous for the Moulin Rouge, sex shops, and peep shows, its side streets and alleys notorious for so much more.
The forces urging her onward were entirely her own; there were no voices, no anxiety, and the demons were silent.
Her senses were overwhelmed by the thirst for revenge,
and she paused for a moment and stood beside a wall, one leg kicked back against it for support while she studied passersby.
The intense focus on murder should have been disturbing, but she felt no conscience.
This was the abyss, that murky mental darkness she had so long held back one anxious breath at a time, though it wasn’t dark.
Here it was light and freedom. It was total control and power and peace.
And enveloped in this goodness was the knowledge that she had finally become the monstrosity of Pieter Willem’s making.
His taunting laughter called out from the dead and was brushed aside as an inconvenient afterthought;
all these years later he had won, and now she no longer cared.
Munroe thrust her hands deeper into the coat pockets and followed the sidewalk.
Her eyes tracked random faces in the pedestrian crowd, her feet moved, and her mind churned in process and calculation.
She crossed to rue Saint-Denis and spotted in a doorway, leaning against stone masonry as if unaware of solicitous glances paid by prospective clients, a body with a face that matched what she’d been searching for.
He was a boy of seventeen or eighteen— prostitute, drug addict, child of the streets. Perfect alibi.
She walked a long diagonal path across the road and made eye contact;
the boy straightened at her approach, his eyes sizing her up in a look disguised as interest.
She was close enough now to breathe him in and allow the other senses to confirm what her eyes had already noted.
Right height, right build, good facial features. Hair would need to be colored and shortened, but otherwise he would do.
“I want you for a week,” she said. “Who do I need to talk to?”
Taking the boy off the streets meant having to negotiate with thugs,
and Munroe followed him down an alley and up narrow tenement steps with her right hand wrapped around the weapon she’d carried out of Cameroon.
There were moments when tension filled the run-down room, when money changed hands and avarice appeared to control mental faculties and a fight seemed inevitable,
but in the end she stepped back into daylight without having to resort to threats or violence and with the boy trailing reticently behind.
She went as far as the end of the street, then turned and stopped.
She grabbed his wrist and pulled him close, lifted his sleeves, searched for needle marks and bruises, found none;
put her thumb to his chin and moved his head to the side, examining his skin.
“What’s your drug of choice?” she asked.
“I don’t do drugs.”
“I don’t have fucking time to waste,” she said. “It’s not heroin, it’s not meth. What is it? Crack? Coke? Prescriptions?”
He mumbled an affirmative.
“You have a dealer?”
He nodded, and she tossed him a phone. “Call him.”
The boy’s first name was Alain, and Munroe didn’t catch his last, didn’t care to, didn’t need it.
He was a breathing and functioning young male whom nobody would miss; it was all that mattered,
and she’d be back to clean up this loose end long before the week expired.
Paying off the boy’s hustlers had been for his peace of mind, not hers.
She wanted him unafraid, comfortable, willingly following instructions.
And they were simple: Remain at the Park Hyatt and run up as large a bill as possible—
room service, Internet shopping sprees, anything he wished so long as for that one week he received no visitors and did not set foot outside the hotel.
Every day he did this, his drugs would be delivered to the room by front-desk staff believing they were handling business documents,
the instructions given them having been far more detailed and explicit than those she gave him.
When Munroe left the hotel, Alain was fast asleep,
and she’d made sure he would remain that way for the final few hours she’d be moving about town leaving the last traceable threads of her existence.
At the bank she deposited her passport, ID, and credit cards in a safe-deposit box
and walked out the door with only the forged Spanish passport in the name of Miguel Díaz and twenty thousand dollars.
She purchased a laptop, burned several copies of Emily’s recording to DVD, and sent two overnight to Logan for safekeeping.
She stopped by a specialty electronics store to purchase harder-to-find items
and then, after calling to confirm locations on Kate Breeden and Richard Burbank, left for the airport, where a charter waited to take her to London.
From there the flight would route to Canada, and she would enter the United States on foot, then travel by road to Boston, where she would connect with a second charter and continue on to Houston.
Munroe spent the trip poring over documents she’d culled off the vastness of the Internet.
Everything she knew about the Burbank assignment had passed through Kate Breeden,
and as information was only as good as its source, everything was now suspect.
Munroe read and jotted notes, her concentration broken only by the stops, starts, and connections of the journey.
Time spent on the ground allowed her to follow threads and download additional files,
and by the time the wheels of the last flight hit the tarmac in Houston, she knew exactly why Emily Burbank had been meant to die.
The eighteen-hour transit put Munroe on the ground a half day behind Miles Bradford and less than ten hours before the board of trustees was scheduled to meet.
It was a narrow window of opportunity, and she counted on Burbank’s greed and Kate’s duplicity to hold them in place until after the board met.
From the airport Munroe caught a cab and stopped first at a pet store before heading downtown to the Alden, where a request at check-in netted the room adjacent to Breeden’s.
As of yesterday this was where Kate had been staying, and although a prior call to the front desk had confirmed that she hadn’t checked out, it said nothing about her actual whereabouts.
In an alcove off the lobby, Munroe switched from leather gloves to latex and dialed Breeden’s room, let the phone ring, and after getting no response, took the elevator up.
In the dark interior of her own room, Munroe removed the eyehole from the door, replaced it with a camera that fed into the laptop,
and then for ease of egress depressed the door latch with a strip of tape.
Preparations made, she lay next to the door with the laptop at her side,
and when her head touched the floor, exhaustion that had previously gone unnoticed settled in.
How long had it been since she’d slept? Thirty-two hours, thirty-seven?
Through two hours of numbing silence, Munroe fought to keep alert, and now, at two in the morning, there was still no sign of Breeden.
Based on Logan’s surveillance photos, Munroe had been certain that Burbank wouldn’t have Kate stay overnight,
but still, choosing the hotel had been a gamble that might have done nothing other than waste a perfect opportunity.
Munroe was waging an internal debate over the emergency recourse of contacting Logan for an update when the soft vibrations of footfalls alerted her to a presence,
and a few seconds later Kate’s profile filled the screen on the laptop.
Exhaustion was displaced by adrenaline,
and Munroe was out the door, in the hallway, and standing behind Breeden with the weapon pressed into the woman’s spine before she’d had a chance to open her door.
“Hello, Kate,” she said.
Breeden jumped slightly, put a hand on her chest, said, “Michael, you scared the bejesus out of me,” and fumbled with the handle.
Munroe opened the door and shoved Kate inside, pointed toward the bed, and said, “Sit.”
Breeden remained standing. Slow and hesitant, she said, “No.”
And then, with a bark of nervous laughter, “What are you going to do? Kill me?”
Munroe slammed the back of her hand against Breeden’s face, and the force of the blow knocked her to the bed.
Kate looked up with shock in her eyes, and then with deliberation wiped a trickle of blood from her mouth.
Munroe pressed the muzzle of the gun to Breeden’s forehead and said, “Yes. I’m going to kill you.
“And the question you need to ask yourself is how much pain you’re willing to endure before you die, because you know I’m certainly capable of inflicting it.”
Munroe took a step back and tossed Breeden a roll of duct tape. “Around your ankles.”
When Kate had finished, Munroe pushed her backward so that she was in the center of the bed.
She wrapped the tape between Breeden’s ankles and then used it to anchor Breeden’s feet to the bed frame.
When she had finished, Munroe stepped back and said, “Fucking touch the tape and I’ll put a bullet in your kneecap.”
Breeden sat, hugged her knees, and a tear trailed down the side of her face. “Why are you doing this?” she said. “What is it that you want from me?”
Munroe ignored the questions and picked Breeden’s purse up from the floor, fishing out the keys. “Which one goes to Richard Burbank’s house?”
A look of pained innocence crossed Kate’s face, and she said, “Why would you think I’ve got his keys?”
Munroe tossed an envelope onto the bed and watched for reaction as Breeden went through the eight-by-ten glossies.
Breeden’s fingers held the photos lightly, flipped through them nonchalantly,
and then there it was, thumb clamped tightly to a photo and a second of hesitation, and then another and another
until the masked calm was replaced by true pain, and Munroe took the photos back and stuffed them into the envelope.
Breeden said, “Michael, this isn’t what it looks like … those photos. It’s not what you think.”
“Doesn’t matter what I think,” Munroe said. “It only matters what is.
“You fucking sold me out, Kate, to a man who cared less about his wife and daughter than he did about his Italian suits.”
Breeden’s face clouded over. She said, “What?” and Munroe held up the keys, jangled them.
“You’ll save me… what? A minute? Two minutes? Which key is to his house?”
“The square brown one,” Breeden whispered.
Munroe laughed, hard and unfeeling. “I hope the betrayal was worth it.” She grabbed Breeden’s left wrist.
Breeden struggled, and Munroe struck her again, then forced the wrist down onto the bed and, with the arm stretched out, wrapped the tape around it and anchored her to the side of the bed frame.
Munroe took the other wrist and repeated the procedure so that Breeden was splayed like a crucifix.
“So why’d you do it, Kate?” she said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Breeden said.
Munroe snapped three leashes onto a choke chain, wrapped and knotted a length of one around Breeden’s feet,
and repeated the procedure with the others around the wrists, then ran them under the bed, tested them for tension, and slipped the choke over Breeden’s head.
Kate’s eyes grew wide, and Munroe said, “I’m not going to kill you yet.”
Using a small penknife, she slit the taped anchors off Breeden’s ankles and wrists, removed the tape from the bed and balled it up,
then leaned over Breeden and tugged on the choke, causing Breeden to gasp and struggle for air.
Munroe released the pressure. “This little guy is attached to your hands and feet.
“If you try to sit up, move your legs, or pull your arms, you’ll die slowly, strangled by your own struggle. You understand?”
Breeden nodded, and Munroe said, “Good.” She released the clip on the gun and removed the bullets.
Wiped them down, pressed them against Breeden’s fingers, leaving a partial to solid print on each, and then returned them to the magazine.
She could have gotten prints on the photos the same way, but provoking Breeden’s reaction had been so much more rewarding.
Munroe searched through the closet, and Breeden said, “You’re not going to be able to pull this off.”
The sweet, sadistic smile of Pieter Willem spread across Munroe’s face as she rifled through Breeden’s clothing.
“Oh, Kate,” she said, “you know me so much better than that. Not only will I pull it off, I’m going to get away with it.”
She removed a shoulder-length blond wig from the case she carried and placed it solidly on her head.
Then, still wearing the smirk, she took a bottle of perfume off the shelf, sprayed it on her neck and wrists, tugged a suit off a hanger, and grabbed a pair of Breeden’s panty hose.
“In fact, I can prove beyond reasonable doubt that I’m not even in the country.”
Using the hose and some bathroom towels, Munroe padded her body to fit the suit.
She dressed in front of Breeden, who kept her eyes mostly on the ceiling or shut.
Breeden’s breathing was calm and regular, and finally, in a near whisper, she said, “How bad could it have really been?”
Each word brought Munroe flashbacks of Francisco’s body in a pool of blood, lifeless on the ground.
She breathed in the rage and allowed it to consume her, tore off a strip of tape and placed it over Breeden’s mouth,
then jerked Breeden’s right hand up from the bed and watched her eyes bulge as she struggled for air.
After a moment Munroe placed the hand back on the bed and ran a finger along the inside of the choke to release the pressure,
then patted Breeden’s cheek. “For your sake,” she said, “let’s hope that things go well for me tonight.”
She placed the laptop and equipment into Breeden’s attaché case, picked out a purse, dumped Breeden’s keys and wallet inside it,
and, careful to leave no trace of her presence or identity, walked out of the room.
She placed a Do Not Disturb sign on Breeden’s door and then in her own room cleared it of any indication that she had been there.
RICHARD BURBANK’S HOME was an apartment that covered nearly the entire floor above his offices.
Dressed as she was, Munroe didn’t even garner a second look from night security when she entered the building.
A card on Breeden’s key ring took the elevator to the correct floor, and Munroe exited into a marble foyer that ended in a door opposite the elevator.
The key card let her soundlessly into Burbank’s home,
and although the unit was dark, city lights filtering through large plate-glass windows provided more than enough illumination to guide her through the maze of furniture and carpeting.
In the living room, Munroe stuffed a pair of Breeden’s panties between the couch cushions and then followed voices to the far side of the apartment.
She stood against the half-open office door and listened to one side of a phone conversation— Burbank and one of his many girlfriends, apparently.
She waited until the conversation had ended and then entered the room, weapon trained on the back of Burbank’s head.
If revenge were to be saccharine sweet, she would have killed him with her bare hands, staring into his eyes as he died slowly.
Unfortunately, a bullet to the head was necessary for consistency.
Her steps were soundless, but the oversize clothes rustled, and without glancing up from his desk Burbank said, “Katie, is that you?”
“No, asshole,” Munroe said. “Kate’s dead, and you’ll be with her shortly.”
Burbank turned, facing into the muzzle of the gun.
Like the rest of the apartment, the office was nearly dark, and Burbank was a silhouette against the city lights, but even in the dimness Munroe could see the terror in his eyes.
His hands trembled, and his eyes twitched nervously in the direction of the phone.
“Hand it to me,” Munroe said.
Burbank gave her the phone and then, in a sudden shift to calm, put his palms out and said, “Look, you don’t want to kill me.
“Whatever this is about, we can work through it. I can give you anything you want. I have connections, power— you know that.
“You want money? I’ll give you money. I can set you up good, no more globe-trotting. Whatever it is you want, I can make it happen.”
“Unless you’re Jesus fucking Christ and can raise the dead, there’s no way you can give me what I want.”
Burbank’s face went blank, and a second later his negotiator personality resurfaced.
“You were never meant to get hurt. No one was supposed to be hurt. We should talk about this some more, work through it, see if we can’t find those who were really to blame.”
“Shut the fuck up,” Munroe said. “You’re making me sick.”
She placed a foot on his chair and pushed it away from the desk. “Stay seated and keep your hands and feet where I can see them.”
She flipped through the automated records on the phone and, not finding what she wanted, said, “We’re calling Nchama. Give me his number.”
Burbank’s mouth dropped open, and he said, “What?”
“You heard me, you fucking bastard. Give. Me. Nchama’s. Number.”
Burbank sat without moving, and Munroe cursed inwardly, torn between the intense desire to inflict pain and the complications of fucking up the otherwise perfect forensics of Kate’s would-be murder-suicide.
“Last warning,” she said. And when again he didn’t move, she fired a shot into his left thigh.
Burbank screamed, lurched forward, and grabbed at his leg, and Munroe slapped a five-inch strip of tape across his mouth.
“You want me to do that again?” she asked.
Eyes wide, fingers streaked with red, and grasping his leg, he shook his head vehemently.
“Good,” she said. “I’m glad we’re on the same page. Now get me the fucking number.”
Burbank pointed toward the desk, and Munroe kicked the chair back toward it.
“Keep your hands where I can see them and don’t give me a reason to take out your other leg.”
Burbank nodded and fumbled with the desk drawer.
“Stop,” Munroe said.
He hesitated and then did as she’d instructed, placing his hands on the armrests.
Munroe stepped between Burbank and the desk, pushed him back again, and with the weapon trained on his chest used the other hand to open the drawer.
She searched through it, then felt along the underside and located a small depression.
She released it, and a hidden drawer sprang open. Munroe removed the handgun, checked the safety, and then slid it into the waistband at the small of her back.
Then she nodded again in the direction of the desk. “Nchama’s number,” she said.
Whatever confidence Burbank had held in reserve was fast fading;
Munroe could see it in his posture, in the way his hands shook, and in the tension in his face.
He dug through a drawer, pulled out a notepad, and handed it to her.
She motioned him away from the desk and to the floor, where, still clutching at his leg and moaning against the gag, he sat with his back to the wall.
With a sneer, Munroe came slowly after him, watched his eyes grow wide as she crouched down to his level.
With the gun to his head and her eyes boring into his, she squeezed the wound on his thigh. Burbank screamed under the gag,
and then, when he had calmed slightly, Munroe said, “I will hurt you. I will hurt you badly if you are difficult. Do you understand me?”
He nodded.
She lowered the weapon, reached for the tape, and ripped it from his face. He began to yell, and she shook her head.
Still crouched at eye level, she said, “You’ve read my dossier. You know what I’m capable of, and you know that I specialize in information.
“This means you also know that I’m not bluffing when I tell you that I know why you left Emily to rot in Africa.”
Her voice was low, monotonous, deadly. “Don’t try to play innocent, because bullshit is only going to prolong your pain.
“I know what you’ve done, and I know why you’ve done it. What I want to know is what you told Nchama that caused him to hold Emily in Mongomo.”
Through gritted teeth and halted breath, Burbank said, “That Emily was an impostor.”
“And you ordered Nchama to kill her?”
“Not in those exact words.”
Munroe prodded again at his thigh, and he swore.
“I didn’t have to,” he said. “Nchama said he’d taken care of it.”
“She called you,” Munroe said. “Nearly a year later, she talked with you. You knew she was alive, and you could have brought her home.”
Burbank shrugged. “By that time it didn’t matter anymore. Emily was pregnant, and Nchama never would have let her leave with the child.”
“What you mean is that with her the soon-to-be-mother of his child, he wouldn’t kill her like you wanted him to.”
Burbank said nothing, and she saw the truth in his eyes.
“So he keeps her, alive but hidden. What is it that you hold over his head?” she asked. “What is he afraid of?”
Burbank gave no response, and Munroe smiled sweetly. “I haven’t time to waste,” she said, singsong and lilting.
“It doesn’t matter to me if you have all your fingers and toes. Does it matter to you?”
When he still said nothing, she placed the muzzle of the gun over his thumb,
and when her index finger coiled for the trigger, Burbank said, “Video footage— a huge under-the-table deal that I threatened to take to his president.”
There was no point in demanding he hand it over. Burbank surely kept copies.
Munroe slapped the tape back across his mouth and said, “Fucking piece of scum.”
Then she stood, took the handset off his desk, and dialed.
She greeted Nchama in English and said, “I’m the one you’ve been hunting,” and then for privacy she switched to Fang.
“I took out your patrol and beheaded your commander. I am a phantom,” she said,
“and if I must, I will hunt you down and destroy you. Is the girl impostor alive?”
Munroe received an affirmative and so shoved the phone in Burbank’s face and again ripped off the strip of tape.
“Tell him plans have changed,” Munroe said. “That you need Emily returned to the United States.”
Burbank managed to stammer only slightly as he spoke, and when he had finished, Munroe took the phone back and continued with Nchama in Fang.
She bluffed through the remainder of the conversation as if she now had the information that Burbank held.
In promising to control Burbank— to control the blackmail— she offered Nchama a way out.
She twisted the promise into a threat should he fail to cooperate,
and by the time the call ended, she was as certain as she could ever be that Emily and the children were free of Burbank’s perfidy.
Munroe had no need for Richard Burbank now. He could die. Then Kate Breeden. That was the plan.
Put a bullet in his brain. Then leave the photos, bullet casings, and Kate’s undergarments and walk out into the night to take care of Breeden’s suicide.
For such short notice, the strategy was impressively flawless,
and she stared at Burbank now, the whining, sniveling excuse for a man who had been the cause of so much pain.
She prepared to fire, but then she stopped. It could have been a minute or two, or ten, that she stood rigid, staring down at him while he whined and shed crocodile tears.
All the while, memory tapes of Pieter Willem and Francisco Beyard danced inside her head, recollections of one man overcoming the other.
And she knew that Richard Burbank wasn’t worth it. “Turn on your computer,” she said finally.
Burbank stood again and hobbled to the desk, and then, with the computer powering on, she tossed the extra DVD with Emily’s footage and the packet of photos on the desk.
She shoved him into the office chair and sat on the edge of the desk, where she could observe his expression while she forced him to watch the entire length of footage.
Burbank’s face betrayed no emotion throughout the viewing,
and if Munroe understood correctly, the wheels of his mind had kicked into action, calculating the damage and planning spin and information control.
If he lived, he would attempt to talk his way out of this, just as he’d talked his way into Elizabeth’s life and so many business deals thereafter, and so she waited until the footage ended.
Then, when the room had filled with silence, she said, “I don’t have to kill you, Richard. You’re already dead.”
Burbank looked into her face, surprise written clearly across his.
“You seem to be a little slow in catching on,” she said. “So let me help you.”
Munroe leaned forward so that her face was only inches from his. “This morning Miles will take a copy of that footage to the board.”
She paused and allowed the information to sink in. “Do I need to get graphic, Richard? What will they do when the truth is known?
“How much power will they allow you, Richard? How much control will you retain? How much wealth?”
She paused again. “You’ve lost it all. Gone. Poof.”
She waited for Burbank’s reaction, read it in the creases around his eyes, smiled Pieter Willem’s sadistic smile, and beat her fist into her chest in mock grief.
“Poor Daddy Burbank. Lost his wife and lost his daughter. Oh! The pain!
“You buried it well, Richard, your dirty little secret— shell companies and corporations behind corporations, all hiding the truth that your wealth and power were nothing but a fa【马赛克2】ade.
"You’re broke, Richard. You have nothing but debt. Everything you own, everything you have— including Titan— belonged to Elizabeth and now belongs to Emily.
“And with Emily missing, everything you retain is at the discretion of the board.”
She smiled again and allowed Burbank to mull this over, then said, “Oh, I forgot to tell you. Your nightmare doesn’t end with the board.”
His face turned quickly toward hers. “How silly of me,” she said. “But that would have been too easy for you and your smooth, glib tongue.
“Emily’s footage and a thorough explanation outlining all this are also being sent to media outlets and law enforcement.
“The charade of your persona may possibly survive the news-shark feeding frenzy,
“but without the power and money granted by the board of trustees, I doubt you’ll survive a courtroom.
“Motive is a powerful thing,” she continued, “and I do believe yours has now been thoroughly documented.
“When you’re arrested— and you will be arrested— your public defender is going to have his work cut out.
“No, Richard,” she said, shaking her head, “I don’t have to kill you. Death would be so much easier than what you have waiting.
“This is a revenge I will be able to enjoy every day for years to come.”
She smiled. “Every night I will think of you, a soft white man with gang members, killers, and rapists as bedtime companions.
“I’ll wake with a smile, knowing it’s another day in the life of Poor Daddy Burbank, the bunkmate’s bitch.
“Word will leak that you’ve gotten AIDS or hepatitis C, that you’ve grown older than your years, and that you’re wasting away.
“Every bit of news will make mine a good day. And when you get out, if you ever do, I’ll be waiting.”
She paused again and whispered, “So far the fall, so great the degradation.”
Munroe indicated the photo envelope she’d tossed on the desk. “Keep these as a memento, because once the shit hits the fan, memories are all you’ll have.”
She stood, slid the silenced pistol into the far corner of the room, said, “Enjoy the rest of your fucking miserable life,” then turned and walked out the door.
MUNROE GOT AS far as the kitchen before the stillness of the apartment was split by the unmistakable hiss of the weapon.
She returned to the office and stood in the doorway only long enough to ascertain that Burbank had been successful.
She removed the DVD from the computer and then went quickly down the hall, through Burbank’s bedroom to his bathroom.
She found a washcloth and soaked it, then repeated the procedure with a second, applying a generous amount of hand soap.
She returned to Burbank. Lifting his right hand with the damp cloth, she wiped it thoroughly, hand to wrist to forearm.
She followed with the second washrag and for consistency did the same on the left.
The soap and water would wash away enough of the trace powder to conceal the crime scene’s silent truths.
Rags tossed into the attaché case, she moved back through the apartment and took the elevator down.
Their encounter had veered far from the initial strategy, but her improvisation would suffice.
Her return to the hotel was on foot, cool air to clear her head, to think things through, to decide what the next step would be,
but it wasn’t until she was back inside Breeden’s room staring at the body of the woman who had betrayed half a decade of friendship that she was certain.
Munroe said nothing to Breeden, merely stripped out of the suit and stepped into her own clothes, then released the gag, the bonds, and the choke from Kate’s neck.
“Are you going to kill me now?” Breeden asked.
Munroe slipped the constraints and suit in with her equipment, turned toward the door, and said, “No.”
“Is Richard dead?” Kate called out.
“Yes.” Munroe said.
And without looking back she walked into the hall, down the stairs, and into the darkened shadows of the city’s steel-and-glass giants, mentally blinded, emotions coursing along a Geiger counter’s range.
She had no direction, no motive, and no place to go.
