Unless I read it all wrong, again.

  He tapped Warner on the shoulder. “"Tell me about March, Chuck. He seems to be something of an enigma."

  The pilot raised his eyes for a second, and brought them down to continue staring ahead across the Great Lake. He spoke one word. "Enigma be fucked. He’s a skinflint."

  Not a great fan of March.

  "You must know more than that. The guy's rich, a big investor, so it's no surprise he's careful with his money."

  Warner grimaced. You know these people, they don't count themselves rich until they’re in hock for a few million dollars."

  "You think he has money troubles?"

  A shrug. "I've heard it said."

  He pressed him further. If there was something strange in his background, they needed to know about it.

  "Do you know anything specific about his problems?"

  He continued staring through the windshield at hundreds of square miles of water. Rhodes assumed he wasn't going to answer, and then abruptly he said, "I heard something."

  "Uh, huh."

  “A passenger I carried, a banker. He was talking on his cellphone. The name March was mentioned. Something about negotiating a loan package from some Russian. I got the impression the Russian in question didn’t smell right.”

  "An oligarch?"

  "Or Russian Mafiya. It sounded like the guy borrowing the money was desperate." He gave another of his noncommittal shrugs, "Maybe it's your guy, maybe not. Either way, Jeff March is a skinflint."

  He tried to fit the pieces of the puzzle together. If March was in trouble, and forced to approach the Russian mob for loans, he had to be desperate. But how would the financier approach shady Russian loan sharks? They didn’t advertise. Then it all clicked in a blinding flash of inspiration. March’s grandparents came to the States from the Soviet Union, during the time of the famines and the purges. They escaped from Ukraine, then part of Stalin's empire. He would have family contacts back in Russia, which tied everything together.

  Vasily Tereshkova would be the link. A Russian banker, visiting Chicago to negotiate a financial deal with someone, and it had to have been with March. He explained his thinking to Maria, and she followed his reasoning all the way, until he mentioned the connection with her ex-husband.

  "It's not possible. If Vasily was involved, why kill him? And why would Jeff March have offered so much help? None of it fits, Cris."

  "Did we see them kill Vasily?"

  Her brow furrowed, and she shook her head. "No, we just heard the shot. We didn’t see anything."

  He let her dwell on that thought for a moment and went on.

  “I get the impression something changed with Jeff March. I doubt he was involved at first, but when you fixed up to visit Alexander, they checked through Vasily’s contacts and came up with Jeff March. How difficult would it be for him to put pressure on Jeff? Cooperate, or they’d ruin him. Bankrupt him."

  She’d gone white. "If it’s true, March has my son. Dear God, what can I do?”

  "They won't let anything happen to him. Not while he’s the bait to reel you in."

  "I must surrender to them."

  "Then they'd kill you, and kill your son. Listen, Maria. I'm going to get him back. Alexander is coming home, and the bastards who took him are going down. Sverdlov and his pal, March, too, if he’s involved. We’ll work out how we play this while we’re refueling. We’ll have a few minutes on our own.”

  Warner decided to put down at Walker Seaplane Base on Chautauqua Lake, which suited them just fine, a quite lakeside refueling station with no likelihood of tangling with Immigration. The pilot made a smooth landing and taxied to the dock. He threw a line to the pump jockey, who tied it to the bollard.

  “What’ll it be, Mister?”

  “Fill her up.”

  “Uh, sure. Where you from?”

  “Lake Michigan.”

  “Michigan, was it? Good flight?”

  “Good enough.”

  “Uh, huh.” He stared at the Cessna, and his gaze lingered for a second on the tail number, "Give me a couple of minutes, and I’ll pump the gas.”

  He strolled away to the shack that served as an office. Warner climbed out of the Cessna. “I’m going to stretch my legs. When he comes back, remind him I want the tank filled.”

  “Will do.”

  They waited in the seaplane as it bobbed up and down on the gentle swell running on the lake. Two minutes became ten minutes, then twenty. Warner came back.

  “Where is he?”

  “No idea.”

  “Damn. We may as well start pumping. The lazy bastard’s probably taking a coffee break.”

  The pump wasn’t locked, and he inserted the nozzle and started the pump. Another twenty minutes passed, and the tank was full. He’d noted the amount and began looking again for the attendant. Finally, he sighed with frustration.

  “I’ve had enough. We’ll wait here forever. I’ll drag him out of that hut and make him take my money. Any longer, I’ll be tempted to take off, and he can whistle for the money.”

  He stomped away, and Rhodes felt the first twinges of unease. “Something’s wrong.”

  “Like what?”

  “I don’t know, but we’ve been waiting too long. Wait, there’s a vehicle coming.”

  A truck, skidding around the corner as it came into sight, engine roaring. The sign emblazoned on the bodywork, U.S. Immigration Service.

  “Shit. He called them. They must have put out an APB. We have to take off right away. Where the hell is Warner?”

  The pilot appeared a few seconds later and shouted across to them, “We have to stay here. It’s those damned Immigration people again. Don’t worry, we’ll talk to them, sort this out, and then we can get going.”

  “Get in the plane. We have to leave now.”

  His headshake was emphatic. “And lose my license? No way. We wait.”

  He disappeared back into the shack, and Rhodes dragged her back to the plane.

  “We’re leaving right away. If they get their hands on you, they’ll never let go.”

  “But we haven’t got a pilot.”

  “I’ll fly it. Untie the mooring line while I start the engine.”

  He seated himself in the left-hand seat, and she joined him a moment later as the engine roared into life. He didn’t wait for pre-flight checks, or any other check. Just advanced the throttle, and the floatplane picked up speed as it taxied into the center of the lake. Warner was shaking his fist from the dock, and then a voice shouted through a bullhorn.

  “Cessna floatplane, you are ordered to return to the dock. This is U.S. Immigration. Failure to comply will result in Federal prosecution for a serious felony.”

  He kept going, turned into wind, and rammed the throttle all the way forward. The Cessna picked up speed, and several shots struck the fuselage, leaving holes where the slipstream tore through, but they were unharmed. He judged the speed when he thought they would unstick, and pulled pack on the column. Nothing, they were still planing across the water. He waited for the speed to build up some more and eased back more gently on the stick.

  This time the floats left the water, and he held the takeoff at a shallow angle, with the aircraft wobbling from side to side as he fought to keep it straight and level. They almost clipped the trees at the end of the lake, and then they were airborne. He held the aircraft at a low altitude while the speed increased, and he made a careful turn to the northeast. Toward Vermont, and a date with two Russian killers.

  They skimmed the trees, and he stayed low to avoid them picking up the Cessna on radar. He was thinking hard, and they had major problems ahead of them. The Russians and U.S. Immigration. The answer was obvious.

  “Maria, here’s the manual of seaplane bases. Take a look at it and see what alternatives we have. We’re not landing at Mallets Head, in Colchester. I need you to find somewhere else."

  She nodded and glanced through the tattered manual he’d plucked from under his seat. "There is one possibility. Grand Isle, Middle Hero Seaplane Base. We could land there. It’s across the water from Colchester and Burlington.”

  “We’ll rent a boat to take you across to the shore."

  "I see. Cris, you never told me you could fly a plane.”

  “I did a course once when I was with DEA.”

  “You have a license?”

  “Sure, I’ve got a private pilot’s ticket.”

  “Right.” She was silent for a few moments, and then she said, “Did you check out on floatplanes?”

  A pause. “No.”

  “You’ve never landed on water?”

  “No. But what the hell, wheels, floats, they’re all the same. Nothing to worry about.”

  “They’re all the same?”

  “Well, they’re similar.”

  She frowned. “Get us down in one piece, Cris. For Alexander’s sake.”

  “For all our sakes. Don’t worry, we’ll make it.”

  He flew on at treetop height, and they made it to Lake Champlain. The landing was not good. He hit the water at the wrong angle. The Cessna bounced up and tilted on one wing. He struggled to regain control, but the water resistance acted like a brake, and the aircraft slowed enough for him to taxi to the dock.

  Hiring a boat to ferry them from Middle Hero Seaplane Base was easy, a simple matter of offering local fishermen about to depart, two hundred dollars to make a slight diversion. Instead of Colchester, they put them ashore outside Burlington. It took them an hour to reach March's luxurious dwelling on the outskirts of the city. He was still plagued by doubts, finding it almost impossible to see his old colleague, the man who'd given them so much help and support, in the role of traitor. A man who would sell out to those who could kill Maria Tereshkova. Then again, history was full of people who would do anything for money. In the case of March, probably a great deal of money, telephone numbers, beyond most people's understanding.

  Would he go along with murder just to secure his ailing finances? Plenty of people have committed murder for much less, but the child?

  He took out the Glock, slid out the magazine, and checked each bullet, just in case he'd loaded blanks. But the bullets were real, and it reinforced his impression that something had changed around the time March rescued them from Immigration and took them to the warehouse. They'd contacted him, and in true mafia fashion, made him an offer he couldn't refuse. Once Maria had asked him to take care of Alexander, she’d unwittingly put her head into the mouth of the lion.

  The lights were on, and music was playing inside. He peered through the windows. March was alone, sprawled on a couch with a half empty bottle of Scotch next to him on a coffee table, listening to classical music playing on an expensive sound system. The music was loud, which made it easier for them. He went back around the house and found a small window to a laundry room. It was open enough for him to free the catch and crawl through. He helped Maria inside, and with guns drawn they crept through the house.

  "There's no sign of Alexander," she whispered.

  "He may be somewhere else in the house. I’ll ask March."

  Before I kill him, if I find it’s true and he has turned traitor.

  He pushed open the door to the living room and crept inside. He came to within ten feet of the man he’d trusted with their lives before March became aware of their presence. He jerked up off the couch, his eyes flaring wide, and Rhodes saw it all then. As did Maria. His guilt was written all over his face, as if in ten-foot-high letters on a billboard. Fear, guilt, dishonesty, they were all there, but he overcame his initial reaction and forced his face into a calm expression.

  "Cris, you're the last people I expected to be here."

  "I bet you are, Jeff."

  "What's up?" He spread his hands wide, palms up, a gesture of innocence, "Why the guns?"

  Maria pushed past and stood with her face a foot away from him. "Where’s Alexander? What have you done with him?"

  "He's…"

  He couldn't answer, and Rhodes said two words that caused him to collapse, "We know."

  The story came out in a few minutes. Just as they'd surmised, he was broke, in debt for hundreds of millions of dollars after a series of failed investments. March had been in process of organizing loans from certain parties in Russia, parties with shadowy, anonymous identities. Then he got the call. Tereshkova told him they needed his help, and if he didn't give it, the deal was off. When the call came in, he was driving home with Alexander, and they'd given him no choice.

  "So Vasily is alive? They didn't kill my ex-husband?"

  "No. He is still alive.”

  "And my son? Where is he?"

  "I don't know." Rhodes couldn't hold back anymore. He was watching an old friend turned traitor, a man who put money before a child’s life. And still he refused to say what he knew. He stepped forward and slashed the barrel of the Glock across his face, leaving a deep cut that bled profusely.

  "Jesus, Cris, don't do that. There was nothing I could do. You have to believe me."

  "You're talking bullshit. You tell us where the boy is, Jeff, or I'll beat it out of you. Ten seconds, and I’ll put a bullet in your belly. You know how agonizing that is. You’ve seen it when we were on DEA raids. Guys shot in the belly took a long time to die, and the screams haunted your nightmares for months afterward."

  The threat was enough. He remembered and gave in. They'd taken Alexander to a remote cabin near the Canadian border. Not the cabin he'd loaned them, but another he’d fixed up for them a few miles away.

  "They said they needed to be close to the border, so they could slip across when the job was done.”

  “I want you to mark the map exactly where they are on there, and anything else you can think of that may help us. A boy’s life is at stake, March. If he dies, his blood is on your hands.”

  "You're going to kill me."

  He didn't answer, but his choices were limited. If he left March alive, he would contact Sverdlov and warn him.

  "Give me a chance," he pleaded, "Listen, Cris, it’s all over for me now, and I swear to God, I never knew it would come to this. One minute, I had deals all arranged, and the next they were calling them off, and I was facing ruin. I was wrong. I'd sooner be ruined than live the rest of my life with the knowledge of what I've done. Let me help."

  "How can you help us?"

  "Take me with you. I want to take these bastards down and help free the boy. No matter what happens, I have a lot to make up for. I've made some bad decisions in my life and this was the worst ever. I want to put things right, Cris. Maria, you must believe me. What I did was madness. All I want now is to put it right."

  He nodded. “Okay, you’re in. First, we’ll need weapons. What do you have here?”

  For the first time in a while he grinned. “You name it, I have it. As I recall, you used an M4A1 when you were with DEA. I can give you one of those. An AR-15, semi-auto as well.”

  He took the familiar M4. It brought back memories of innocent blood spilt, the screams of the innocent, and his vow never to fire a gun again in anger. Since that promise, he’d done a lot of shooting to keep Maria alive. And the killing was still going on.

  Maria took the AR-15, and he tucked a couple of spare pistols, a Colt 1911 and a spare Glock 17 into his coat with some spare magazines. March drove away fast in the luxurious Mercedes G wagon he kept in a heated garage. When he led them to it, he grinned like an Arab bazaar merchant displaying his wares. "I keep this baby just for special occasions, and I reckon this one is special."

  They didn't smile, and he drove away from the house, heading north toward the Canadian border. They traveled through the night, and the temperature fell below freezing. He was still suspicious about March's motives for coming in on their side, although on balance he felt more able to trust him. Something in the millionaire’s demeanor had changed. He was no longer the brash, successful man people expected to have a yacht stashed in a marina, as well as a private jet, a string of houses, and any number of beautiful girls in tow. He'd aged ten years, and yet some of the guile and deviousness had left him. Cris was trying to make a final decision about trusting him, when it came to him. March really was on their side, and much more.

  He’d come to realize a startling truth. He'd wanted to join them not just to rescue Alexander and kill the Russians who'd turned his life into a nightmare. He wanted to die. He was a man who'd come to terms with what he'd done. Whose mistakes and miscalculations had finally turned his life into a living hell, and there was no way out, except for one, death.

  Halfway to their destination, March popped a question that gave him pause for thought. "Those guns you brought from my place, I want you to let me carry one. You can trust me, Cris. Believe me, I know what I've done, and I'll be on your side all the way. Just give me a chance to get back."

  Maria had flashed him an anxious glance, but he decided to go with it. They'd be going up against two deadly opponents, Sverdlov and his surviving operator, the man whose name they now knew was Stepashin. He had no idea whether they'd be prepared for an assault, but when they failed to show at Colchester, it was a reasonable bet they'd retreated to the Canadian border anticipating he would come. In which case they'd be ready, and another gun would be more than useful.

  "Take one of the handguns, Jeff. I'd advise you to keep pointed away from Maria or me. Just in case we get the wrong idea."

  “Sure, sure. I'd sooner shoot myself than see something bad happen to either of you."

  From the back seat, Maria said, "You try it, and you won't need to shoot yourself. I’ll do it for you."

  "Right."

  They reached a deserted parking lot about a mile from the cabin where he'd said they were holding Alexander.

  "We can't go in there. They'd hear the engine, and they'd be prepared. We can hike in from here, and I'll show you a way around to the rear. The cabin has security lights at the front, but as far as I know, nothing at the back. We'll be able to approach in darkness and get the drop on them. If we’re lucky."

  He nodded. "Go ahead, take the lead."