Angel of the Dark

David thought, At least the bugging devices are working properly. The only thing more terrifying than going through with tonight’s plan would be going through it with technical hitches.

Danny McGuire said, “Try to relax. I know it doesn’t feel that way, but you’re perfectly safe in there. We’ve got your back.”

“I’ll try to remember that this evening when my wife’s boyfriend starts lunging at my jugular with a sharpened machete.” David laughed weakly.

“You’re doing the right thing. Come tomorrow morning, this will all be over.”

David Ishag hung up the phone and swallowed hard. He knew that if he allowed himself to cry once, the tears would never stop.

“This will all be over.”

No, it won’t.

For David Ishag, the pain of Sarah Jane’s betrayal would never be over. Without her, he might as well be dead.

AT SIX P.M., DANNY MCGUIRE SAT in the back of the transit van, dividing his attention between the screen in front of him and today’s London Times crossword puzzle on his iPad. It was Richard Sturi, the statistician, who’d gotten him hooked on British-style crosswords and Danny had quickly become a junkie. They helped relieve the stress and loneliness of running Operation Azrael, helped him forget how much he missed home and Céline, helped him block out the fear about the state his marriage might be in once this operation was finally over.

The London Times puzzle was usually the most challenging, far superior to that of the New York Times or Le Figaro, but today’s setter seemed to be having an off day.

One across: Wet yarn I entangled.

As anagrams went, it was laughably easy. As Danny typed in the answer—R-a-i-n-y—his mind started to wander. When had he last been in the rain? A month ago? Longer? It rained a lot in Lyon. Here in Mumbai the sun was relentless, beating down punishingly on the stick

y, humid city from dawn till dusk.

“Sir.” Ajay Jassal, a surveillance operative on loan from the Indians, tapped Danny on the shoulder. “The catering van. That’s not the usual driver.”

Danny was alert in an instant. “Zoom in.”

Jassal was eagle-eyed. Even up close, it was tough to make out the van driver’s features on the fuzzy green screen. It didn’t help that he was wearing a cap and had one hand covering the lower part of his face as he waited for the service gates to open.

“You’re quite sure it’s a different driver?”

The young Indian looked at Danny McGuire curiously, as if he were blind. “Yes, sir. Quite sure. Look at his arms, sir. That is a white man.”

Danny’s pulse quickened. Ajay Jassal was right. The arm dangling out of the driver’s-side window was a distinctly paler shade of green than that of the rear gatekeeper waving him into the compound.

Was this him? Was this the killer?

Was the face beneath that cap the face of Lyle Renalto, aka Frankie Mancini?

Have we got him at last?

The barrier lifted. Lurching forward, the driver put both hands back on the wheel, turning slightly to the side as he did so. For the first time Danny McGuire got a good look at his face.

“I don’t believe it,” he whispered.

“Sir?”

“I do not fucking believe it.”

“You know the man, sir? You’ve seen him before?”

“Oh yeah.” Danny nodded. “I know the man.”

It wasn’t Lyle Renalto.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE