“And if we do this,” Maggie said, “what happens to you? Do you get away with all this?”
“For a while. Unless the two of you decide to come after me. People are so unforgiving,” he said with a sigh.
Mack smiled grimly. “They do have a habit of holding grudges,” he agreed.
“I’m sure you won’t fall prey to such base emotions,” Van Zandt replied.
“Trust me,” Mack murmured, and Maggie felt his hand tighten on hers. She squeezed back, in complete agreement.
“We do have some sense, Jeffrey,” she lied with a charming smile.
Van Zandt’s eyes were bright with cheerful malice. “You do,” he agreed. “But you’re tiresomely idealistic, darling, you know you are. I’ll have to hope Mack will curb your martyr tendencies.” He rose, slender, graceful, infinitely charming. “I’ll be in touch.”
“You want to make sure we do it?” Mack questioned in a caustic voice.
“Oh, I’ll know when you do it. The reverberations will be felt all around the world.” He smiled. “Good luck, my friends.”
“Will we need it?”
“Oh, I expect so, Maggie. I do expect so. Things are never easy.” And he drifted out the door with a gentle wave of his hand.
Maggie stared at the closed door. “Should we go after him?” she inquired in a calm voice.
“It wouldn’t do us any good,” Mack said. “He was right, wasn’t he? We don’t have any choice in the matter. Even if we could protect ourselves from some of the people after us, there’s no one who can protect us from everyone.”
“No.”
He let go of her hand, rising to pick up the packet of material Van Zandt had left them. “Do you think this is a setup?”
“Undoubtedly. I’m sure he wants us to kill Mersot. I’m also certain he’s not planning for us to leave the chalet once we do so. In the CIA they learn to be as thorough as the Mafia. No loose ends.”
“No loose ends,” Mack echoed, dropping the papers back on the table. “I guess we play this game to the end. You want to go out for dinner?”
“No.”
“Room service?”
“No.”
He turned to look at her, something in her tone of voice catching his attention. “What do you want then?”
“You,” she said simply, and waited. He had every right to turn away, to turn her earlier refusal against her, to reject her. But unlike herself, Maggie thought, Mack hadn’t a self-destructive bone in his body.
One moment he was across the room, abstracted, the next he was pushing her down on the bed, his mouth capturing hers in a kiss of surprising sweetness. “You know that I love you, don’t you?” he whispered against her mouth.
She laughed, an oddly carefree laugh, given their life-or-death predicament. “I know, Mack,” she said, sliding her arms around his neck and pulling him against her. “I know.”
* * *
There was an odd, Twilight Zone kind of sense to their trip the next day. They followed Van Zandt’s directions dutifully, trying to blend in with the cheerful, smiling tourists, trying to come up with light conversation when both of them wanted to sit huddled with their own dark thoughts. They left their rental car at the train station in Interlaken for the first leg of their journey of death via Lauterbrunnen to the tiny, perfect little Alpine town of Wengen. And then on up, another seven miles to Kleine Scheidegg, to face the terminus of the cog railway and the advent of the worst part of their journey.
Van Zandt’s maps were clear. Maggie and Mack had dressed wisely, with sturdy walking shoes, layers of clothing, and loaded guns. When they finally left the chattering merrymakers they sank into a silence that neither of them wanted to break. Somewhere deep inside, Maggie thought, she had to find the courage to face what lay ahead. It might be the murder of an evil old man, it might be Mack’s death and her own. She’d faced death before, without flinching. But somehow with Mack it was much harder. She didn’t want to die, and she didn’t want to lose him. More than ever she wanted to live, to love, to experience everything clean and joyous. But first she had to climb this beautiful, sunny Alpine meadow and head into a valley of death.
Mersot’s chalet was a deceptively innocuous building, miles away from the center of the tourist activity, almost hidden by the overhanging cliffs of the Jungfrau. They followed sheep tracks, narrow, beaten little paths that provided dubious footing, and Maggie was almost relieved when they finally caught sight of the sprawling, Austrian-style building hidden against the cliffs.
“That must be it,” Mack said unnecessarily.
“Yes.” She rubbed her ankle absently. “Do you see anyone around?”