The Assassin (45 page)

While he was speaking, Raseen had crossed the room to take the chair opposite his. The Beretta was still in her hand, but she held it down by her side, out of view. Rühmann could not help but look at her, and when she opened her mouth, her melodious voice poured forth. From that point on, Vanderveen became part of the furniture.

“Herr Rühmann, we are only here to ensure our security.” She leaned back in her seat and crossed her legs, tilting her head to the side. Everything about her posture suggested a calm, relaxed disposition. “We need all of the documents pertaining to the storage facility in Canada. We need anything that might link you or us to the device, including financial transactions, and we need it immediately. You see, we have reason to believe a man from the U.S. government is on his way to interrogate you, and we wish to stop that from happening.”

“You mean you intend to kill me,” Rühmann said stiffly.

“I didn’t say that,” Raseen pointed out softly. “All we want are the documents. You’ll have to come with us, of course, but we have no intention of killing you. You and your contacts are much too important to our organization.”

“And where is Karl?”

“I have no idea. We left him in Potsdam.”

Rühmann seemed to draw into himself for a moment. His face was expressionless, but Raseen could see that his mind was moving quickly behind those dark blue eyes.

“You say the U.S. government is behind this?”

“Yes.”

“How did they track me to Berlin?”

“We’re not sure. They got your name from Mason, but that doesn’t explain how they tracked you here.” Raseen paused thoughtfully. “Of course, it might have something to do with the break-in at the German Embassy. I assume you heard about it.”

“Bastards,” Rühmann hissed, his face contorting. “I told them they had to take me out of the database. I told them that a thousand times….”

Raseen waved it off. “It’s not important. All that matters is getting you somewhere safe, along with any relevant documents.”

“
Relevant
documents? If the Americans are coming here, I’ll have to destroy everything.”

“How?”

“Burn bags,” Rühmann answered absently. “They’re used by the military and the CIA. The ones I have are designed for instant use in the field. They burn the contents while the bag stays intact. I managed to get hold of them through my friends in the
Bundeskabinett
.”

“What about a computer? I assume you have one.”

“Yes, I have a laptop. I’ll have to pull out the hard drive.”

He fell silent for a long moment, studying his hands, thinking it through. Finally, he said, “Where are you planning to use the device?”

Vanderveen looked up to address the question. “You don’t need to know that.”

“Bullshit!” Rühmann turned to glare at the younger man. “I’m the one the Americans are after. I think I deserve to know.”

“It doesn’t concern you.”

The Austrian didn’t seem to hear, and appeared to wither before their eyes, his face crumpling. “I knew this was a mistake from the start,” he said in a low voice. “It’s too big… It was always too big. Don’t you see? If you use the device in the States, I’m finished. The Americans know I was at Al Qaqaa. They managed to keep the story quiet, but a select few still know what was stolen out of that facility.”

He looked at each of them in turn, finding nothing in their neutral expressions. “This has something to do with Paris, doesn’t it? That Iraqi minister who was killed.” His voice started to rise. “What about the prime minister in Baghdad? Was that part of it, too? Answer me!”

“You supplied the weapons,” Vanderveen remarked quietly. “You had some idea where they were going. What do
you
think?”

Rühmann didn’t seem to hear. “I should have stayed out of this,” he muttered. “It’s too big. I’ll never be able to move again.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Raseen said. “You took the money. You can’t back out now.”

“They’ll trace the device to me.” The Austrian arms broker looked sick. “Thousands will die. They’ll never stop looking.”

“They can’t prove a thing,” Vanderveen lied. He knew that Rühmann was the primary suspect with respect to the theft at Al Qaqaa in 2003. It was never intended that the Americans should learn of the Austrian’s involvement in the upcoming attack, but since he had been tied to Mason, the connection would eventually be made; it was all but inevitable. Still, the situation could be fixed easily enough. All Vanderveen had to do was pass additional instructions to the informant in New York. The informant, in turn, would suggest to his FBI handlers that Rühmann was working for the Iranians, which would further muddy the waters.

“We’ve taken many precautions, Mr. Rühmann.” Raseen’s voice was low and strangely seductive. “Your continued well-being is very important to us.”

“I see,” Rühmann replied. He was clearly skeptical. “You have an interesting way of showing your gratitude. You come here to warn me of danger, yet the first thing you do is show me your guns.”

Raseen smiled gently, shooting a quick look at Vanderveen. He had already discovered a number of pertinent documents, which he’d stacked neatly on top of the desk. “Well, we didn’t know if you’d see it our way, Mr. Rühmann. You did have a gun of your own, after all.”

“Right.” He looked over at Vanderveen, an annoyed expression crossing his face. “If you want my help, you can start by getting away from my desk.” He motioned to the Beretta in Raseen’s hand. “Do you mind?”

She shook her head. “Go right ahead.”

The Austrian stood warily and moved to the desk. Vanderveen stepped aside as the older man started pulling paperwork out of the drawers. The frustration was clearly taking hold, and he finally let it out in a bitter tirade. “This is ridiculous,” he spat, accidentally knocking a sheath of paperwork to the floor. “I don’t know how you found me, and I don’t care why you’re here. This kind of intrusion is completely unprofessional. I’ll never work with you people again, no matter how this—”

“Don’t be stupid,” Raseen said, interrupting him calmly. “Our business relationship is very profitable for you. If you have any sense at all, you won’t throw it away over some hurt feelings.”

Rühmann did not reply, his anger fading as he shot a curious glance to the door. Vanderveen was examining the frame, running his fingers over the lacquered wood. He walked the length of the wall, bouncing his knuckles against the velvet-covered surface. After a moment, he looked back to the Austrian.

“What’s behind this wallpaper? Plaster?”

Rühmann frowned. He seemed annoyed at the suggestion that his exquisite surroundings could be constructed of something so crude. “It was exposed brick when I bought the place. I had it covered with plaster to hold the wallpaper. Why?”

Vanderveen frowned in turn. Ignoring the question, he walked back to the windows, his gaze fixed on the flat roofs of the buildings across the river. Realizing he wasn’t going to get an answer, the Austrian turned to a painting behind the desk, a large Turner landscape. He lifted it gently from the wall, revealing a safe.

“Stop,” Raseen commanded. Vanderveen turned instantly, alarmed by the sharp note in her voice, but she waved him away.

Walking over, she gestured for Rühmann to step aside. “What’s the combination?”

He gave it to her, and she opened the safe. Inside, there were a number of burn bags and a small pile of numbered folders. No weapon. She gestured for him to continue. He pulled out the folders and started to push them into the bags, along with the documents stacked on the desk.

It took less than five minutes to fill all the bags. Raseen used the time to unscrew a small panel on the bottom of Rühmann’s Hewlett-Packard laptop. Once she had the hard drive out, she slipped it into her pocket. Rühmann pulled the tabs on the burn bags, destroying the contents. All that emerged was a thin whisper of smoke. Vanderveen watched everything from his spot by the windows. His face was neutral, the gun resting on the ledge by his hand. He had dropped the backpack by his feet, and on several occasions he’d caught Rühmann staring at it with interest.

The Austrian fell into the seat behind his desk and sighed wearily. “So, that’s it. When is this American supposed to arrive?”

“Sometime tonight,” Vanderveen said. Kneeling, he unzipped the pack and started removing items. Some of the equipment had been supplied by the man in Dresden; the rest he had picked up himself at an electrical supply store. He pulled out the Semtex first, two half-pound blocks of grayish white material wrapped in green polyurethane.

Rühmann, leaning over his desk, recognized what he was looking at immediately. His eyes went wide. “What the hell are you doing with that?”

Vanderveen did not reply. Setting the plastic explosive aside, he reached into the pack and produced a bundle of electrical blasting caps, a bulky roll of insulated copper wire, wire strippers, a handful of clothespins, and a pair of 6-volt batteries. Finally, he removed a soldering iron and a plastic bag filled with hundreds of steel ball bearings.

“What the hell are you doing?” Rühmann repeated.

Vanderveen looked up, but he didn’t offer an explanation. “Tell me something, Herr Rühmann. The door in the entrance hall… Does that lead to the stairwell?”

This was information that had not been contained in the file. “Yes,” Rühmann said, obviously struggling to see the relevance. “It opens to a brief flight of stairs; then there’s another secure door on the fourth-floor landing. You need a code to get through.”

“Is there an alarm?”

“Yes, but it only activates my security monitors.”

“Give me the code.”

The Austrian recited four digits from memory.

“Good.” Turning to Raseen, Vanderveen switched to Arabic. “I’m going to need some type of metal containers. Can you find me something like that? Coffee cans, for example? Look in the kitchen.”

She went out as the Austrian looked on in utter confusion. Vanderveen was busy stripping the ends of a 20-foot length of wire when Raseen returned a minute later, bearing two large silver cans.

“What are you doing with those?” Rühmann asked, still standing behind his desk. His gaze swung between them rapidly. Receiving no reply, he elevated his tone. “I asked you a question, Kohl.
What the fuck do you think you’re doing?
”

Without looking up, Vanderveen murmured a few words in Arabic.

Rühmann looked to Raseen. “What does that mean? What’s he saying?”

She didn’t reply. Her arm swung up, and she fired into the Austrian’s face from a distance of 2 feet. The three shots came in rapid succession, so close together they sounded like one. Rühmann was already slumping when she fired the last round, his ruined face slack, his eyes and mouth open in a final expression of pure astonishment. He fell into his seat at an angle, flipping it over, coming to rest on the floor with one leg strewn over the upended chair.

Raseen lowered the gun and took a seat on a nearby couch. Then she leaned back and closed her eyes.

Twenty minutes later, she was in the kitchen making coffee when Vanderveen walked in. “I’m finished. Are you ready to go?”

She nodded. “I walked down to the door on the fourth floor. The code works fine. If someone really wants to get in that way, they’ll be able to do it.”

“Good.”

After an extensive search for any paperwork they might have missed, they walked back to the entrance hall and entered the elevator. Vanderveen had dragged Lang’s body out of sight, but Rühmann was still in the office, lying exactly where he’d fallen. The doors closed, and Vanderveen punched the appropriate button. As the doors slid open on the ground floor, he snapped off the key in the lock. Anyone trying to reach the penthouse suite would be forced to take the stairs.

They stepped into the dingy, empty foyer. There was just one apartment on the ground floor, that of the caretaker. Her number was posted on the buzzer outside the building. Raseen rapped on the door lightly as Vanderveen stood off to the side, out of view of the peephole. After a few seconds, they heard a muffled “
Ja? Was benötigst sie?
”

“Frau Hesser?” Raseen called lightly. “I’m Sara, Herr Rühmann’s new assistant. He sent me down to ask you a favor. Do you have a minute?”

There was a long pause. Finally, the door cracked open. Raseen offered a friendly, appealing smile, and the door opened all the way, light spilling into the foyer. Vanderveen, standing off to the side, only saw part of what happened next. Raseen pushed her way into the caretaker’s apartment, slamming the door shut behind her. Stepping forward, Vanderveen heard a brief scream, followed by two dull thuds. Then the door swung open, and Raseen reappeared. She didn’t need to speak; a brief nod said it all.

They left the building and turned west. It was just after 6:00 p.m. Night had drifted over the city, and it started to rain as they walked, thunder booming in the near distance. They reached the Mercedes five minutes later. Vanderveen started the engine as Raseen climbed into the passenger seat. Soon they joined the light traffic moving north on the Friedrichstrasse. As they crossed the river, Raseen lifted the pack out of the backseat, where Vanderveen had tossed it before starting the car. Opening the main compartment, she extracted a pair of two-way radios. Like the rest of their equipment, the Motorola radios had been supplied by the man in Dresden. She turned each unit to the appropriate channel, then plugged in the headsets.

Vanderveen turned onto a narrow street running along the river, trying to gauge his position. As he looked to his left, a gap appeared between the buildings, and he saw a flash of Rühmann’s building on the other side of the Spree. Vanderveen eased his foot off the accelerator. The curb was choked with cars, so he stopped in the road and flicked on the hazard lights. Fortunately, there was no traffic behind them.

“Here,” Raseen said, handing over the pack. One of the radios was still inside, along with several bottles of water, a shooting mat, and a large poncho. Getting out of the car, Vanderveen slung the pack over his shoulder. There was one other pack in the backseat, but he ignored it and walked to the back of the car. He retrieved a black plastic case from the trunk as Raseen slid into the driver’s seat.