Day of Wrath

Half the street lamps were out — evidently smashed by vandals and left broken by an overworked city bureaucracy.

Trash and dog excrement littered the pavement. Most of the tenement-style buildings packed close together in all directions were liberally daubed with graffiti, soot, and torn and tattered political posters.

Most of the cars in sight were old and cheap — a mix of Volkswagens, Fords, Renaults, and even a few dented Trabants. Except for a few elderly men and couples out walking dogs, there weren’t many pedestrians on the streets.

“What do you think?” Helen said, skeptically eyeing their surroundings herself.

Thorn shook his head. “I don’t like it. It’s too damned quiet.

This isn’t the kind of neighborhood I’d have picked for a rendezvous.

There’s not enough traffic. We’ll stick Out like a sore thumb.”

“Maybe the RP itself is busier,” Helen said.

“Yeah … maybe.” He summoned up a mental picture of the street map he’d memorized before they set out to meet Mcdowelli’s man. The SBAHN station was about five blocks north of the intersection they were aiming for. About a five-minute walk if they headed straight there.

Not that he had any intention of doing anything that stupid.

If nothing else, the ambushes at Pechenga and Wilhelmshaven had again pounded home all the old lessons he’d learned as a combat soldier: Never move blind in unknown country. And never, ever, do the expected or the easy.

He turned back to Helen. “Feel like a little stroll?” He nodded up the street — directly away from the rendezvous point Mcdowell had specified.

She flashed a quick, thin smile. “My thoughts exactly, Mr. Thorn.”

Together, they turned and walked north — back the way the SBAHN tram had brought them — pausing often to check windows or the sideview mirrors of parked cars for any signs that they were being followed. At the first opportunity, they turned right down a narrower side street and picked up the pace. From time to time, they stopped suddenly — hoping to flush out anyone trailing them.

Nothing.

Ten minutes of hard, fast walking and several more turns brought them out onto a wider north-south avenue — one running just a block east of the intersection they were heading toward.

There were even fewer cars and fewer pedestrians out on the streets now.

Thorn took Helen’s arm and pulled her into a shadowed doorway with him.

He nodded toward the next corner. “I should be able to take a quick look at the RP from there.”

“Oh? What’s this “I,’ Peter?” she asked quietly.

“This is where we split up,” he said. “if anybody unfriendly is out there waiting for us, they’ll be looking first for a couple. So I’ll just mosey on over there — run a fast recon — and then swing back. In the meantime, you keep an eye on my back. just in case we missed somebody on our tail. Okay?”

Helen’s eyes narrowed. “You really don’t trust Larry Mcdowell, do you?”

Thorn shrugged. “From what you’ve told me about him, and from what I saw at the crash site, I trust him to be a lying, slimy, incompetent asshole.”

She laughed softly. “I’d say you have the man pegged just right.

Okay, Peter, you go run your sweep. I’ll watch your back.”

He kissed her once and then stepped out of the doorway. He sauntered off, whistling softly under his breath — determined to look and act as much as possible like a local making his way home from one of the several pubs they’d passed.

At the corner, Thorn stopped briefly — looking both ways before crossing the street. He let his eyes sweep west down the block toward the intersection Mcdowell had picked out as the rendezvous point, scanning for anything and anyone out of the ordinary.

Nothing. Nothing.

There! His eyes lingered for an instant on the dark Mercedes sedan with Berlin plates parked halfway down the block under a burned-out streetlight. That’s too nice a car for this neighborhood, he thought grimly. And he’d bet a month’s pay there were a couple of guys sitting inside that can-hidden behind tinted windows. His senses went on full alert.

Without breaking stride, Thorn crossed the street, putting a graffiti-smeared apartment building between him and the Mercedes. It took him another five minutes to circle his way east and then north again to get back to the doorway where he’d left Helen on watch.

“Well?” she asked.

“We’ve got trouble,” Thorn said. He filled her in on the car he’d spotted.

“Might just belong to the local Lotto winner …” she said slowly.

Thorn grinned. “Why, yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus …”

“Very funny, Peter.” Helen tapped her watch. “We’ve still got fifteen minutes before Crittenden is supposed to show. You want to scope this out a little further?”

He nodded. “Let’s say I’m kinda curious to find out who may be gunning for us this time.”

She shook her head. “Jesus, Peter, I sure hope you’re just being paranoid.”