The Evolution of Fear (Claymore Straker #2) - Paul E. Hardisty Page 0,37

in the deepening gloom distorted everything: the layer of fresh snow frosting the confusion of bare black beams; the wisps of smoke that rose from the dark open middle of the place; the smell of charred timber reaching him now.

He pulled the car to the side of the road, shut down the engine, opened the door and stood looking out through the flying snow. A chill shuddered through him. He took a few steps forward, stopped, kept walking, the soles of his shoes sinking into the powder as he trudged down the drive, the full extent of the damage now clear to him, the old oak beams and trusses blackened and burnt away, the roof caved into the wet, charred guts of the place, the gleaming pine floors gone, the hand-laid stone chimney rising from the ash, and everywhere the fiery taste of purgatory.

Part II

14

The World Can Go and Fuck Itself

7th November 1994: Somewhere over Bulgaria

Transiting Europe at ten thousand metres, Clay considered again the circumstances of his position. Before he was killed, evading capture near the Omani border no more than three months ago, Claymore Straker had been wanted for at least eight murders in Yemen, had been officially labelled an Ansar Al Sharia terrorist by the Yemen Government and the CIA. Despite LeClerc’s surprising news that someone had been arrested for the murder of Rex Medved, Clay was far from safe. He would have to be doubly careful back in the Middle East. He had spent more than six years working in the region as an independent consultant on oil and gas projects, mostly in Yemen, Egypt and Libya. He’d also done work in Turkey, spent time in Istanbul. For three of those years he’d lived in Cyprus, and his Cyprus-registered company, Capricorn Consulting, was still in existence, its affairs still, he supposed, nominally handled by his Cypriot accountant. His flat in Nicosia would surely have been rented out by now, his possessions boxed up and disposed of – however the system dealt with a dead man’s stuff when he had no next of kin.

At least he now had some idea of Rania’s whereabouts. He’d stayed at the chalet for a long time watching the snow fall into the black pit – a mourner at a grave. Then he’d trudged the couple of kilometres up the road to the Auberge des Arcs, the place where he and Rania had spent a couple of summer afternoons drinking beer and looking out over the valley at the glaciers of les Dents du Midi shimmering in the sun. Clay spoke with the patron, who remembered him, remembered Clay’s very beautiful wife. That’s what he’d called her: femme. Clay didn’t bother correcting him. The fire had been two days ago, he said. It had started at night, and by the time les pompiers arrived it was too far gone, a total loss; such a shame, a beautiful place, very old. Clay nodded in agreement and enquired about the occupants. The aubergiste answered that no one was home at the time, and no one had seen or heard of Madame Debret, the elderly owner, since before the fire. Clay thanked him, ordered something to eat, which he only picked at, then called LeClerc from the patron’s phone. The conversation had gone something like:

LeClerc: I am very sorry. I have made a terrible misjudgement. I should never have sent her. Forgive me.

Straker: Jesus.

LeClerc: I know where she is.

Straker, heart seized – those words, the anonymous message: Tell me.

LeClerc: Istanbul.

Straker:

LeClerc: Monsieur Greene?

Straker: What the hell is she doing in Istanbul?

LeClerc: Following a story. Several stories, actually.

Straker: Where is she staying?

LeClerc: We don’t know. She hasn’t checked in yet.

Straker: They torched her house.

LeClerc: Pardon?

Straker: Burned her house down. (But maybe you already know that.)

LeClerc: Mon dieu. (A long pause, LeClerc thinking something over, coming to a conclusion.) What will you do?

Straker: I’m going to find her. (I’m going to find her and get the hell out. Go back to Africa, sail off the map, just the two of us, untraceable. You and the rest of the world can go and fuck yourselves.)

LeClerc: Our Istanbul station chief will meet you at the airport. Let me know when you have flight details. I will do everything I can to help. Be careful, Monsieur Greene.

Clay had driven through nightfall, following strobe-lit snow ploughs and sanding trucks, the roads otherwise deserted, the snow gradually turning to sleet then freezing rain as he lost altitude. He joined the autoroute for Geneva