A Tangled Web by Judith Michael Read Free Book Online Page B

wonder about you. I pay you to make them trust you. I pay you to get information to me in time for me to use it.”
    â€œWell, you did; you got out in—”
    â€œNone of us should have been on board in the first place.”
    â€œI didn’t hear a thing until this afternoon, boss, honest to God. I called you on your plane, but you’d landed and the pilot said you’d just left for the dock. I got down there as soon as I could, but you were gone, so I called you on the ship’s radio; what else could I do?” There was a silence. “So you went forward, right? I mean, when you knew the bomb was under your stateroom . . .”
    â€œWe went forward.”
    The others had been unpacking in their rooms, but Max had insisted on going to the lounge. “You can unpack later, Sabrina,” he had said. “I want a drink; I want you to see Monte Carlo in this light.” And they had gone forward.
    In fact, he’d thought he had plenty of time. His man, who had worked his way into Denton’s organization, had told him the bomb was set to go off at seven, when everyone was dressing for dinner. But Max was not one to sit calmly on top of a bomb without doing something about it. He had planned to leave the lounge after a few minutes and get the engineer to go with him to find the bomb. But then it had occurred to him that the engineer could be part of the plot. Whoever brought the bomb on board and found a place to hide it and then left the ship without anyone being suspicious . . . whoever did that couldn’t have managed it without help from someone on the crew.
    He had been thinking about that while pouring drinks in the lounge. “It looks like a little girl’s birthday cake,” Stephanie had said, looking at the pastel colors and rococo designs on the buildings of Monte Carlo, stepping up the hill from the shore.
    Max brought her a drink and saw the sudden cloud that shadowed her face. “What is it?”
    â€œI was thinking about little girls’ birthdays,” she said, and he grasped her hand, angry at her for letting her thoughts take her away from him. He put her glass in her hand and curved her fingers around it. And then the bomb went off.
    In the small motorboat, Max cradled Stephanie’s head against him to protect her from the pounding vibration of the engine. They were racing west, toward Nice, the beaches and harbors of the Côte d’Azur on their right. The sun was still bright, but the beach was emptying as bronzed men and women gathered possessions, packed them into brightly striped raffia bags, and strolled to the hotels lining the shore.
    â€œAlmost there, boss,” said the man at the wheel. “Burt’s waiting at the dock; he took care of the helicopter. Trouble is, we didn’t know you’d need a stretcher or an ambulance or, you know, so there won’t be anybody waiting when we get to Marseilles.”
    â€œBurt can call from the helicopter. An ambulance and a hospital.”
    â€œRight; he’ll know where to go; he’s lived there all his life.”
    Nice was a jumble of buildings behind the forest of ships’ masts in the harbor; the cafés on the Promenade des Anglais were crowded with people settling in for late afternoon drinks. Max looked at them, thinking that that familiar life was closed to him for a long time. Then he turned away as his small boat chugged slowly to a deserted part of the harbor near a cluster of squat warehouses, and eased into place at the far end of the dock.
    A black Renault was parked close to the dock; beside itstood a short, slender priest with a brown beard. He squatted as Max’s men tied the boat to the dock. “I heard you were coming in today; I came to greet— Mon Dieu, Max, you’re hurt!” He leaned into the boat, his hand extended. “But who is this? She’s bleeding . . . Max, what happened?”
    â€œAn