The Lincoln Myth (Cotton Malone 9)

His plan was to become the eighteenth.

And this discovery might just help.

He gazed around the cavern and imagined what had happened here in 1857.

Everything about this place fit the legend.

Only now it had been proven true.

FOUR

COPENHAGEN, DENMARK

8:40 P.M.

MALONE PILOTED THE BOAT WHILE LUKE DANIELS, HIS CLOTHES soaked from the end of his skydive, kept low to avoid the briskness that raced across the windscreen.

“You a regular jumper?” he asked.

“I’ve got over a hundred in the logbook, but I haven’t landed in the water for a while.”

The younger man pointed at Kirk, who sat huddled near the stern, and yelled over the motor’s roar, “You’re a pain in my ass.”

“Care to tell me why?” Malone asked.

“What did Stephanie tell you?”

Good move, answering a question with a question. “Just that an agent is missing and this guy may know where he is.”

“That’s right. And this one here ran like a scalded dog.”

“And why is that?”

“ ’Cause he’s a snitch. And nobody likes a snitch.” Luke faced Kirk. “When we get to shore you and I are goin’ to have a chat.”

Kirk said nothing.

Luke stepped closer but stayed down out of the wind, knees flexed in response to the pitch and pound. “Tell me, Pappy, are you really as good as everyone says you are?”

“I ain’t as good as I once was, but I’m as good once as I ever was.”

“You know the song. I love Toby Keith. Saw him in concert about five years ago. Didn’t take you for a country music man.”

“I’m not sure how to take you.”

“Just a humble servant of the U.S. government.”

“That’s my line.”

“I know. Stephanie told me to say that.”

“You understand,” he said, “that plane of yours was about to be sprayed with automatic rifle fire. Charging so low was foolish.”

“I saw the rifle. But he was standing on a swaying boat, and it looked like you needed help.”

“Are you always that reckless?”

He throttled the engine back as they approached the Copenhagen waterfront.

“You got to admit, that was pretty cool flying. Those wheels weren’t, what, six feet off the water.”

“I’ve seen better.”

Luke grabbed his chest in mock pain. “Oh, Pappy, you cut me to the core. I know you were once a navy top gun. A fighter jock. But give me a morsel. Somethin’. After all, I saved your hide.”

“Really now? Is that what you did?”

In another life Malone had worked as one of Stephanie Nelle’s original twelve agents at the Magellan Billet. He was a Georgetown-trained lawyer and a former navy commander. Forty-seven years old now. But he still had his hair, his nerve, and a sharp mind. His sturdy frame bore the scars of being wounded several times in the line of duty, which was one reason why he’d retired early three years ago. Now he owned an old-book shop in Copenhagen, where he was supposed to stay out of trouble.

“Go ahead. Admit it,” Luke said. “It was going to be tough to get away from those guys. I saved your ass.”

He cut the engine and they eased past the Danish royal residence, then the pier at Nyhavn, swinging starboard into a placid canal. He docked just beyond the Christiansborg Palace near a spate of outdoor cafés where loud patrons were eating, drinking, smoking. The crowded square fifty yards away was Højbro Plads. Home.

The engine quit and he turned, swinging a right uppercut that slammed into Luke’s jaw, dropping the agent to the deck. The youngster shook off the blow and sprang to his feet, ready for a fight.

“First off,” Malone said. “Don’t call me Pappy. Second, I don’t like your cocksure attitude, it can get people killed. Third, who were those men trying to kill us? And, finally”—he pointed at Kirk—“who the hell is he snitching on?”

He caught the look in the younger man’s eyes, which said, I so want to jostle with you.

But there was something else.

Restraint.

Not a single one of his questions had been answered. He was being played and didn’t like it. “Is there really a man missing?”

“Damn right. And this guy can show us the way.”

“Give me your phone.”

“How do you know I have one?”

“It’s in your back pocket. I saw it. Magellan Billet issue. One hundred percent waterproof, which they weren’t in my day.”

Luke found the unit and unlocked it.

“Call Stephanie.”

The number was entered.

He gripped the phone and said, “Take Kirk and wait over by that café. I need to speak with her in private.”

“I’m not real keen on takin’ orders from retired guys.”

“Call it repayment for fishing you out of the water. Now go.”

He waited for an answer to his call and watched as Luke and Kirk hopped from the boat. He wasn’t an idiot. He realized that his ex-boss had schooled this upstart on how to handle him. Probably told him to push, but not push him away. Otherwise a hotshot like Luke Daniels would have been all over him. But that would have been okay. He hadn’t had a good fight in a while.

“How long did it take before you pu

nched him?” Stephanie asked after the fifth ring.

“I actually waited a little longer than I should have. And I just killed two bad guys.”

He told her what had happened.

“Cotton, I get it. You don’t have a dog in this fight. But I really do have a missing man, who has a wife and three kids. I need to find him.”

She knew what would work on him.

He spotted Kirk and Luke fifty yards away. He should have waited until they were inside his bookshop to make the call, but he was anxious to know the situation so he kept his voice low, turning back toward the canal away from the cafés.

“Barry Kirk knows things,” she said in his ear. “I need him debriefed, then help me out here. You and Luke go find my agent.”

“Is this frat boy you sent any good?”

“Actually, he never went to college. But if he had, I assure you he wouldn’t have been in any fraternity. Not the type.”

He figured Luke was maybe twenty-seven, twenty-eight, probably ex-military, as Stephanie liked to draw from their ranks. But his lack of respect and reckless moves seemed contrary to any form of institutionalized discipline.

And he wasn’t a lawyer.

But he knew Stephanie had been gradually relaxing that rule for her agents.

“I imagine he’s a handful,” he said into the phone.

“To say the least. But he’s good. Which is why I tolerate his … overconfidence. Kind of like someone else who once worked for me.”

“Those men were right there,” he said to her. “On the water. Ready for us. That means either they were lucky, Johnny-on-the-spot, or somebody knew you called me. Did your missing man know where Kirk was headed?”

“No. We told Kirk to head to Sweden.”

He knew she was asking herself the same question.

How did those men know to be there?

“I assume you’re only going to tell me what you think I need to know.”

“You know the drill. This isn’t your operation. Just see about my man, then you’re done.”

“I’ll handle it.”