“It wasn’t me.” Queen’s voice was panicky. “Maybe Gallo did it on his own. He doesn’t tell me everything.”

“It doesn’t matter. I’ll get to you both.”

“Look, we can work this out. You need me as much as I need you. They would have executed you years ago if I hadn’t protected you. You know that’s true.”

“And the reason you protected me is that you know the minute they catch me, I’ll tell everyone how you’ve constantly stolen evidence and whisked me away from the local police. In how many countries? At least a dozen.” Turn the screw. “And I’ll give details to the media. Ugly details horrify the media. You’re so comfortable in your cushy job, just waiting to retire and tap all the money you’ve stolen and go to some Caribbean island. That dream would be blasted to hell. They’ll start a witch hunt.”

“Maybe I made a mistake,” Queen said. “I admit I was getting nervous. I needed someone who would just do the kills I assigned, then go undercover until we needed him.”

“Oh, someone who didn’t like his job?”

He hesitated. “I may have thought that you were out of control.”

“I am. You’ve never been able to control me.”

The little girl at Gate 1 was wandering away from the flight attendant again. Black felt tension grip him. It was too tempting. The challenge, the possibility … the hunger.

“Give me another chance,” Queen said.

He jerked his attention away from the girl. “Why now? Why did you send Benkman now?”

“I told you that—” Queen stopped. “Gallo is becoming difficult. I’m tired of dealing with him. I needed a sacrificial lamb.”

Black burst out laughing. “And I was your lamb? What fools you are. You should have let me kill him when I wanted to do it.”

“We had our doubts whether you could do it. He’s as nasty a piece of work as you are.”

Black’s smile vanished. “I could do it.”

“Then maybe we could deal. You forget my lack of judgment. And I turn you loose on Gallo for a very substantial sum. Look on it as a challenge.”

The challenge was the little girl at Gate 1. Gallo would only be an amusement in comparison. “How much?”

“Double the last job.”

“You really are finding him difficult. Or me a threat.”

“A little of both,” Queen said. “I want information from him before he dies. I need a ledger he’s been holding.”

“How do you know I won’t take it?”

“You wouldn’t be interested. Blackmail requires a certain effort and restraint. You only want one thing from us.”

Freedom to keep doing what he loved best.

Queen knew him better than he’d thought.

“I might be interested. I’ve always hated Gallo’s guts.” He added, “As long as you understand, you won’t get another chance with me. Where is Gallo?”

“Mazkal, Utah.” He paused. “Where are you?”

“San Francisco.”

“Very close.”

“I’m close to you, too. Only a few hours away.”

“But you’d get nothing by killing me.”

“Except satisfaction.”

“Be reasonable.”

“But all the FBI profilers say that men of my persuasion are seldom reasonable.”

The flight attendant at Gate 1 was leaning on the departure gate desk and talking to the gate agent.

The little girl was standing several yards away looking out the huge window at the planes.

“Black, change your mind.”

“I may. Or I may not. If you’re not dead in the next twelve hours, then you’ll know that I’ve decided to forgive you and gone after Gallo instead.” He hung up.

He leaned back in his seat, his gaze on the little girl. Such shining brown hair, such a pretty little girl.

Her flight wasn’t due to board for another fifty-five minutes. That was enough time to lure her out of the airport.

If the flight attendant was as careless and self-centered as she appeared.

If the little girl was as innocent and eager as he judged.

If Black could use all his skill and cleverness to persuade her to come with him.

It would be difficult. It would be a challenge …

So should he accept that challenge? Should he forget her and get on his flight to Washington? Or should he catch a later flight to Utah?

Let the little girl decide.

He got to his feet and strolled casually toward the window.

If it proved too awkward or dangerous a task to take what he wanted, then he’d return to his own gate and continue to Washington.

If he was able to lure the little girl from the airport, then he’d come back after he’d sated himself and take the flight to Utah.

He stopped a good five feet from the child and gazed out the window, ignoring her. Never too close at the start. In the crowded airport, it would be better to use words rather than actions. And they must be the right words. But he would have no problem. He was an expert, a master, at this game.

Queen or Gallo?

Sweet little girl, you choose who is to die.

CHAPTER

11

“YOU’RE PROBABLY GOING TO be very angry with me, Eve.”

John’s voice. John Gallo’s dark eyes looking down at her.

She was lying on a couch. Red drapes at the window. Where were they? A motel…?

“It may help to know that I made sure that you wouldn’t have so much as a headache.”

Not a motel.

She was jarred wide-awake.

She sat bolt upright on the couch. “What the hell!”

“It’s fine,” John said quietly. “It may not have been the diplomatic way to go about it, but you’re so surrounded by people who would have gotten in my way that I decided this was the safest way to handle it.”

She had a sudden memory of the numbing sensation as she’d handled the pen. “A knockout sedative in that pen? No, it wasn’t diplomatic. How the hell could it be?” She looked around the huge room. A study. Walk-in stone fireplace, book-lined walls, four floor-to-ceiling windows. “And where the hell am I?”

“My place in Utah. It seemed to be the safest place for a get-together?”

“Utah? You knocked me out and bundled me off to Utah? You are crazy.”

“I told you.” He smiled. “And you’re not scared. How refreshing.”

“You want someone to be afraid of you? It won’t be me. Go screw yourself.”

“I don’t particularly want it. It just happens. So I use it.” He leaned back in his chair. “Now be quiet so that I can look at you. When I was masquerading as your friendly FedEx deliveryman, I was trying hard to make sure that you wouldn’t look at me. Which meant I couldn’t really look at you.”

She glared at him. “You had plenty of time to look at me while you were bringing me here. How many hundreds of miles?”

“But you were unconscious all the way here on the plane, and there was no spirit to be seen. What I remembered most about you wasn’t on the surface. I want to see if it’s still there. Just give me a moment.”

She drew a deep breath and tried to rein in the anger. She needed a moment of recovery, too. Shock and anger had blurred everything in their wake. She had reacted as she would have done if he had been the John Gallo she had known at sixteen. He was not that boy. He was a man and one of whom she had to be wary. But she’d be damned if she would be afraid of him.

Though perhaps there was a reason why he inspired fear, she thought as she studied him. There was a chilling quietness, watchfulness, about him that she didn’t recognize as a quality in the boy she had known. His stunning good looks had survived the years, same olive skin, dark piercing eyes, slight indentation in his chin. Faint lines at the corners of his eyes told of time in the sun, a thin strand of white streaked the dark hair above his temple. His lips were the same except for a curve that was faintly reckless. Yes, he looked older, harder; the edge that she remembered had become dagger sharp. He weighed less, still muscular, but spare, whip-lean.

Her gaze shifted up to meet his eyes. “As you can see, I’m not the same person. Comparisons are impossible. We start new, John.”