Page 101 of The Number of Love
Drake could only shake his head. “I don’t understand. What murder scene?”
“Ah. This was of the utmost interest to me, too, despite my certainty you had nothing to do with it. I had to expend considerable effort and call in many favors to determine this.” Abuelo waved his fingers again, and again Eneko stepped forward.
Eneko’s expression said more than Abuelo’s did. That whatever this was, it was serious. He held out a thin stack of papers clipped together, a photograph on top.
Naturally, Drake’s eyes went first to the image. And his head went light at the grainy shot of two men entering a building. Grainy, but good enough to see their faces.
“El Señorwas providing for us with that photograph, sí? A woman had her camera out, at her window, to try to get a snapshot of her son riding on his bicycle—you see him there in the foreground. She did not realize she had captured anyone else in her image until weeks later, when she received her pictures back. And even then, she only came forward when we put an advertisement in the newspaper, asking for any information to be had on suspicious men seen at that address.”
“Suspicious men,” Drake echoed, eyes still pasted to the image.
Margot had leaned in, too, and had drawn in a long breath. “It’s him. The taller one—that’s the man who attacked us. Was he the one following you?”
“Yes.” Drake swallowed. “And the other is Maxim Jaeger.” Jaeger, clutching at his leg. Jaeger, agony on his face. Jaeger, supported by the man in the grey overcoat, looking as though he wouldn’t have been able to walk without said support.
Red, who had been hovering in the doorway behind him, eased forward to study the image. “They look a bit alike, don’t they?”
“A bit.” He’d thought the mystery man had been familiar, hadn’t he? Slightly? But he’d assumed he’d seen his picture. It hadn’t occurred to him that he looked familiar because a few of those features Drake had memorized were the same as Jaeger’s. The nose. The eyes. That was where the similarity ended, but seeing both faces together now, it was obvious. “They’re brothers.”
Margot’s breath eased out again. “Drake ... have you ever heard that other man speak?”
He could only shake his head, easily following her train of thought.Shemight have, during their Go game, but she’d certainly never heard Jaeger. But if they were brothers ... “It could have been him on the telephone. Not Jaeger at all.”
“If Jaeger is the name by which you know the injured one,” Abuelo chimed in from the desk, “then I can promise you he did not place any telephone calls after the seventh of November. He is deceased. His body was just discovered in a shallow grave outside the city a few days ago. A bullet apparently severed the artery in his leg. We believe he bled out in that building the photograph shows him being led into.”
“A bullet.” Drake closed his eyes, well remembering the pistol in his hands that day as he climbed the ladder on the train car. Firing wildly, blindly, just trying to keep Jaeger down. But if his opposite number had already stood up ... His fingers tightened around Margot’s. He’d killed him. He hadn’t meant to. Hadn’t, honestly,wantedto. Yes, it was war. Yes, he knew what was expected. But recognizing a man was an enemy didn’t mean he wanted to eliminate him entirely. Because he wasn’tjustan enemy. He was a man. A son.
A brother.
But Maxim Jaeger was dead—undeniably. And his brother was here.“You will pay,” he’d said. Not for the sugar, not for the anthrax. For Maxim’s death.
Margot must have been doing the same arithmetic in her mind. She tugged on his hand, angled toward the door. “Red, you said the guard was gone from the door? And Dot wouldn’t answer? Not even for you?”
No. Drake didn’t need to be pulled. He surged forward, doing the pulling.
“Dragón.” Abuelo had stood, and he must have rushed to get to the door by the time Drake put his foot on the first step. “I do not know if it matters, but Jaeger was not the name I was given when I asked one of my German contacts to discover his identity for me. I was told he was Heinrich Regnitz, a decorated officer before he and his brother, Dieter, were both recruited into intelligence.”
Feet itching to launch him up the stairs, Drake still paused long enough to shake his head. “How did you discover all that, Abuelo?”
“I have friends in high places. On both sides of the war.” His brows lifted again. “Apparently closer than I knew on the Allied side. I expect a full explanation from you before I go home. I have long known you were not taking more classes, but I would like to know what youhavebeen up to.”
Eneko appeared behind Abuelo. “I told you he ought to have his wings clipped.”
Drake didn’t spare the time it would take to roll his eyes. He bounded up the stairs, Margot at his side and Red a step behind them.
“Heinrich Regnitz. The one that telegram was about.” Margot had no trouble keeping pace. “And the man we’re looking for must be Dieter Regnitz. His brother.”
“His brother.” Drake’s chest went tight. “I killed his brother. I had to fire off a few shots as cover, to give myself a chance to get away. I must have hit him. Just before he hit me. I didn’t mean to kill him.” He knew well that emotion tightened his voice. Emotion he’d never dare let slip out in the presence of another soldier. But somehow, he thought Margot would understand. “I didn’t even mean tohithim. Just force him down.”
Red’s step faltered. “Wait, you were...? Elton, I believe I require the same explanation you owe your grandfather.”
“Later, Red.” They charged up the final stretch of stairs. First he had to make sure Dieter didn’t take his revenge on the most likely candidate.
Drake’s sister. Drake’s sister for Dieter’s brother.
But the corridor yawned frighteningly empty when they gained it. No guard, as Red had said, even though Hall had stationed one there in Camden’s place last night. Even though Drake had given the chap strict instructions not to let anyone but Red in, not to let her out alone, and not to leave hertherealone.
“Dot?” he called through the door even as he inserted his key into the lock and turned. “Dot!”
