Page 71 of Prisoner of War
Zalaya grew still. “Is that so?” he said quietly, glancing at Serrano.
Serrano sighed. It was too late to recover from this now. He mentally cursed Torrez’s flaring temper and big mouth. Usually the man was far more stable, but usually he didn’t have Zalaya needling him with the precision of a surgeon. “Youcan go,” he told Torrez shortly.
Torrez nodded, unable to hide his relief. He headed for the door, skirting Zalaya carefully.
When the door shut, Zalaya tapped his fingertips on the top of the cane, a quiet thrumming. “Just how many men do you have embedded in that house?”
Serrano shrugged. “That’s a need-to-know figure.”
Zalaya rammed his fist onto the desk, making the ormolu clock bounce.“And I need to know these things!This assassination was the wrong move and I could have spared you the error if you’d come to me first.”
“If we’d hit Escobedo, you wouldn’t be saying that.”
“You were never going to hit him that way! I could have told you he wouldn’t personally accept an invitation that involved a public appearance. The man has holed himself up in that barricaded house and nothingshort of a disaster will bring him out.” Zalaya’s mouth turned down. “Well, you’ve given him the disaster.”
“Remember your place,” Serrano said, trying to keep his voice as cool as possible. He was startled by the change in Zalaya—the sudden flare of temper was something he had never witnessed before.
Zalaya straightened up. “I know why I am here,” he said, just as abruptly the cool schemeronce more. “I am your intelligence director. I cannot do my job in a vacuum. I must have information. Data.” He smiled briefly. “Facts. If I do not have all the facts, I cannot assess and interpret correctly.”
“It’s also your job to uncover the facts,” Serrano pointed out. “I’m not here to do that for you.”
“You’re not supposed to be withholding them either.” Zalaya changed direction. “Tellme who worked the job on Blanco. I’ll arrange to have him pulled out. Damage control—we need to get him back before they sniff him out, for Escobedowillfind him now you’ve kicked him into gear.”
Serrano picked up his pen and pretended to get back to work. “That’s not something you need to concern yourself with. I have it under control.”
Zalaya’s answer was a long time coming. “I see,” he saidat last.
When Serrano looked up, Zalaya was reaching for the door handle. “Where do you think you’re going?” Serrano asked, astonished.
Zalaya smiled. “I’ve been around you long enough to know when I’ve been dismissed.”
After the door had shut softly behind Zalaya, Serrano sat for a long time staring out the window at the cloudless blue sky that was all he could see from here. The featurelesssky was a comfort. As long as he could see no buildings, he knew that no potential snipers could get a sight line on this window, or him sitting behind it.
The comfort was a background emotion. He was busy turning thoughts and impressions over in his head.
Although Zalaya was the expert at manipulating and reading men, Serrano had acquired a degree of skill in it, too. His expertise came viahard experience and it took deep thought and deliberate application for him to arrive at useful conclusions, whereas Zalaya seemed to reach inside a man’s mind and pluck his thoughts wholesale. That was why Serrano employed Zalaya, so he did not have to strain himself outguessing his opponents.
Therefore, the long moments he sat thinking now were challenging ones, but the results were well worththe effort.
At the end of twenty minutes he opened the top drawer of his desk and pulled out a cell phone, ignoring the two telephones sitting on his desk. The delicate cell phone was too small for his big hands and he was forced to tap out the text message at turtle speed. He sent it, turned off the cell phone and threw it back into the drawer.
It was time to do his own prodding.
