DEADLY DRIVER Page 14

  “But you’ve put me at risk. A journalist suggested I should be concerned - that someone might have a hard on for me since I was driving when he stroked out.”

  “I doubt you’re in any danger, except for maybe the musketeers. They’ve been known to go off book from time to time. Once you’re back in the States the new boss wants to meet you, the sooner the better. Until then, I’ll be your go-to. Now tell me about Jack Madigan. I understand you two are at odds. He’s been a good resource from what I’ve read in the file. His being on another team, he stayed with Werner I understand, makes your working together much less convenient. But we can work with it if you two can. Is the relationship repairable?”

  Bryce shrugged. “I think time may heal those wounds, but you’d have to ask him. He’s not talking to me.”

  Ryan looked around the quarters that would be Bryce’s mini-suite, his sanctuary over the next three years whenever Formula One was racing in Europe. Then his focus turned toward the three photos on the wall. He stepped to them and stared.

  “He didn’t call you after your uncle died?”

  Bryce shook his head. “Listen, you know what really got this started don’t you?”

  It was his guest’s turn to shake his head.

  “I never killed anyone,” Bryce began. “Uncle Pete was a great guy, former military, raised me like a son and taught me volumes, but he also had his flaws. He was nomadic, coming and going as he pleased. Hell, half of that was my fault since I put fifty grand in his bank account every year and got him an all-access credential so he could come to the races whenever he wanted. He also had a temper and a zero tolerance. I’m talking not an ounce of tolerance, for assholes. Jack and I cleaned up after him four times, and somebody caught us on tape dumping bodies. We never killed anybody – at least not until your employer, my own government, blackmailed us into it.”

  Ryan just listened but didn’t respond. Bryce was lying and realized he might be better at driving than acting. The guy sitting across from him was a professional, and Bryce didn’t want to give any indication there might be dirt on him they knew nothing about. Nothing to look for, like the death at the speedway in New York all those years before.

  “There was no way I could let Pete go to jail, especially in some of the countries where he lost his temper.”

  “Okay, if all that is true and he’s dead now – I assume that really happened and he’s not hiding on some island you bought somewhere – why not just refuse to help us anymore?”

  Bryce felt his temper start to rise. “Don’t insult my intelligence. You guys have had me by the balls for years. You have incriminating videos of me, and Jack. Other than me just asking to be cut loose I don’t have much leverage. We’re about even on that score.”

  His guest smiled. “Bingo. I can’t tell you everything that we’ve discussed about you but I can tell you this – if you had retired at the end of last season they probably would have forgotten about you. When your new contract was announced the agency went back to reviewing the race schedule and discussing operations.”

  Bryce sat quietly for a moment. “You just can’t make this shit up.” He reached back for a bottle of water and tossed one, fast and without warning, to his guest and then reached for another for himself.

  “Let’s get one thing straight right here, champ. I’m here doing my job but don’t think I won’t shove the next thing you toss at me up your ass if you show an ounce of aggression towards me again.”

  Bryce laughed and checked his watch.

  “It’s a date.” They stared at each other, sizing things up.

  “So, I’ll play along. Guess I have to, for now, like the patriot I am. But only as long as you brief me on why someone needs to be terminated. For the record, Pete is dead and buried. Also, for the record, I’ve been keeping notes on all the shit the CIA has asked me to do, forced me to do. If anything does happen to me off the track, the international media will get it all.”

  “You’re watching too much television. That’s a bluff. Remember, we have a file on you, too.”

  “I feel like we’re playing chess so here’s my checkmate. The next time I’m at the White House posing with the president and a championship trophy, I may have to mention this little arrangement you’ve boxed me into.”

  “I’ll let you share those thoughts with the new boss once you two meet. You can direct your hostility toward her too if you’d like but from what I’ve been told, she has something better in mind for you. For now, we need to talk about Max Werner. We’ve intercepted enough of your conversations to know you are clean. But Werner, he’s another story. Perhaps we can get together in Barcelona before you fly out and I can share some information you might be interested in.”

  “You’re kidding?”

  “About Werner?”

  Another knock at the door interrupted them and Bryce spoke with someone without letting them enter.

  “Time to get back to work. I’m sure I’ll hear from you again. You guys always seem to know how to find me.”

  The man smiled, handed Bryce his card and assured him he would be in touch. Bryce took a minute to check his hair in a mirror and then looked at the man’s card again and shook his head in frustration before sliding it into his money clip.

  Bryce followed the staffer down the circular steps and and then toward pit road to resume the VIP and Media Day activities. In the distance he saw Max Werner giving an interview and shook his head as he walked. What have you gotten yourself into now?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  Regarded by many as a spectacular city—the European center of fashion, food, wine, desserts, and artwork—Paris had much to offer, and Bryce had experienced all of it on many trips before this one. His journey had begun just two hundred miles north of the city, a few short hours before. The plan had been to attend the launch of a new associate sponsor for the race team, a breakfast at the Royal Automobile Club’s Pall Mall location in central London. A British watchmaker was paying dearly to have its name on Bryce’s car, fire-resistant driving suit, and left wrist. Most of the other big names in racing had watch deals, but Bryce had held out and finally received an offer truly too big to refuse.

  “I know they’d like me to refer to this engineering beauty as a time piece,” he said to the assembled media, holding up his wrist as he smiled. “But in all honesty, this is the best damn watch on the market.”

  Bryce collected watches and had at least a dozen in various sizes and shapes—Rolex, Patek Philippe, Omega, TAG Heuer—all gifts or awards for winning races and championships around the world. At home, he wore a simple Timex Ironman and kept a half dozen of those in a kitchen drawer. He’d ruined too many expensive watches over the years, working on race cars, and knew this one could take a beating. For the money he’d just now been given, by contract they’d all now have to sit idle and gather dust. He had agreed to wear, out in public, only the sponsor’s watch for the next three years.

  He posed for photos with the principals, team owner Ameer Kazaan, and a few male and female fashion models. Then his new assistant, Vicki Dini from Milan, introduced him to a journalist who was going to accompany Bryce for the rest of the day. She was writing a Day in the Life series of articles. She already had followed soccer, boxing, golf, and film actors, but she told him as they were introduced that this interview was one she had been most looking forward to.

  Her name was Susan Lee and she had flown in the day before from Shanghai. She was also there to cover the press conference as part of a publicity effort for the upcoming F1 race in China. Her English was excellent, which Bryce always appreciated. He was accustomed to being interviewed by journalists in countries all over the world and, while English might have been a second, third, or even forth language for them, sometimes he struggled to understand them. Not so much their words but their accents and the manner in which their sentences were asked.

  Lee, the daughter of a Chinese diplomat, grew up and attended schools in London. She spoke the Queen’s E
nglish as if she was a Brit, which would make the day much easier for him. The fact that she was nearly deaf as a result of a childhood illness impressed Bryce. Lee learned to read lips at a very early age, she told him during the ride to the train station. She confided that this helped her excel in school and her profession. All she requested to make the interview a great one was for candor and eye contact. Bryce promised to oblige.

  A quick limousine ride to the St. Pancras train station and Bryce, Lee, and two bodyguards (casually dressed and staying at a distance) boarded the tunnel train bound for downtown Paris. Not long after their departure, Bryce and Lee sat in opposing seats and began the interview as they made the two-hour ride that included a thirty-mile trip under the English Channel.

  “You joked about Vicki being your latest assistant?” she began. “Does that mean you go through assistants very fast?”

  He smiled and leaned forward. She gestured for him to sit back. “Lip reader,” she said. An attendant operating a beverage cart placed coffees and waters they had requested on the mini-table that jutted out from the train car’s window.

  “No, that’s not the case at all,” he explained. “They keep getting pregnant and go off to start their families. A situation that I had nothing to do with,” he assured her with a smile. But then his mood changed as he reflected on the women he had grown close to in his life but had left to pursue theirs.

  “When I raced NASCAR back in the States, I worked with a great girl by the name of Melissa Steck. She and I hit it off from the get-go. She took great care watching out for me and keeping me on schedule, caffeinated, and out of trouble. Her husband was a great guy, is a great guy, but when they decided it was time to start a family, she quit the racing game. Then I found another assistant, and she was great but got pregnant. Max Werner hired someone for me who said she had no interest in having kids but wound up falling in love and starting a family. She was from Iceland. Jenni was her name.” He smiled and watched as Lee jotted a few notes, even though she was recording their words on her phone.

  The interview continued and covered a great deal of Bryce’s life, from his earliest days in racing to riding a high-speed train bound for France.

  “I have heard,” she corrected herself, “I have been told that, despite all the fame and fortune, the type of life you live can be a lonely one. I could see from your eyes when you were talking about your various assistants that you were fond of them and miss them. What about the rest of the people close to you – the racing teams? Does the camaraderie that you share, the goals, the wins and the losses, all make you one tight family?”

  Bryce finished his coffee then tossed a piece of chewing gum in his mouth to counter the aftertaste. He looked out the window and just then felt the shudder of the train moving at speed into the tunnel opening. He turned to answer after considering his words.

  “I’ve had the best of pals and the worst of enemies in this sport. But, yes, at times, it can be a lonely proposition,” he began. “There are some great people in motorsports. I’d say ninety-nine percent of them are. We share a passion for an incredible sport that we are all lucky to be part of. But things happen. People change teams – I just did. Loyalties have to be to the car owner, the crew chief and the engineers and teammates and the new driver, not the people from the previous team.” He paused for a moment to think. “Trust is huge, but that’s the case in any relationship. In racing, we share technology, knowledge, and experiences—despite the NDA’s and confidentiality agreements—and all of that has a way of flowing into a new team. That can cause issues. But to a man, and woman, I can say that no matter what team you are on, when someone is in trouble, people respond.

  “I remember two drivers in NASCAR who hated each other’s guts. But when they were involved in a big crash at Daytona one year, their cars came to a stop within twenty feet of the other. When one car caught fire, the other driver was the guy who pulled the hot driver, his sworn rival, out of the car.”

  She smiled. “There are rumors that there is much more to what happened in Mexico when you were off-roading and two people died. What can you tell me about that incident?”

  Bryce’s mood changed, and he had no problem showing it on his face or with his words. “Vicki told you anything regarding Mexico was off-limits,” he glared. He’d seen this move so many times before. The interviewer lets you settle in, get comfortable, and then they throw a curve ball and ask you something out of left field.

  “Let me rephrase my question, Bryce, please. My apologies.” She leaned forward and placed her left hand on his knee. She left it there as she continued. “What I am trying to say is that while you put your life at risk in race cars, you walk around with bodyguards. Your life obviously must be at risk from other threats. Can you speak to that?”

  He stared at her for a moment. “Yes and no,” he began. “Mostly I have people around me to help maintain distance between me and an overzealous fan who’s had a few too many Heinekens or perhaps the fan that’s angry because I passed his favorite driver on the last lap to win the race. That happens. Race fans, like soccer fans, are very passionate. Not as much as the American football fans back in Philly though.” From the look on her face Bryce thought she wasn’t buying it. Her next question confirmed it.

  “Is that why you and all the other drivers ride around in armored cars followed by car loads of armed bodyguards in places like Brazil?”

  “You’re persistent, I’ll give you that,” he told her and looked across to the two armed men sitting on the other side of the aisle, who were now staring at her. Security was a huge issue and one most prefer not to discuss.

  “I’d just say we live in different times and precautions have to be taken.” He gestured for her to turn off her phone, which she did. He leaned in, for effect not because she couldn’t hear him. “We can end this right now or we can change the subject. My security and the security of all the other drivers and people you’ve been interviewing for your series is very important and confidential. That’s the last I’ll say on this. So, you can turn that back on, Miss Lee, or you can move to another seat.”

  She looked at Bryce and then the two men sitting across from them.

  “I understand one hundred percent,” she said, nodding to Bryce and to the guards.

  She pressed record on her phone and then threw him another question, one he’d been asked more than most. “So, what do you do if you have to go to the loo?” she asked with a grin.

  The rest of the train ride and the interview went as planned. Once they worked their way out of the station in Paris, to a waiting black Mercedes limo van, they headed to another publicity event scheduled for four o’clock at the Four Seasons Hotel George V. As part of the appearance a suite had been arranged for him for the evening before moving on.

  Remarks about the rumors he would compete in this year’s 24 Hours du Le Mans endurance race, a few photos with members of the racing associations there, and then he would be free. When that little happy hour event had concluded, and Lee witnessed first-hand how a few gregarious fans that crashed the gathering had to be escorted from the hotel, she told Bryce she understood now.

  “I only have a few brief questions left,” she told him.

  He was amused by the way she used her tone and her eyes to attempt to charm him into spending more time with her. He turned to his security team and said, “Frisk her.” They moved toward her. She tensed and looked worried.

  “Just kidding. Come on – come upstairs. I’ll give you ten minutes more and then I have other things to attend to,” he said.

  His suite was an elegant white-and-blue space with a white sofa, lit fireplace and a spectacular view of the Eiffel Tower across the room from it. He carried his own bags. That was just the way he preferred. After dropping them in the bedroom he came back into the main room to find the journalist in a much different mood.

  She had a gun, and was pointing it straight at his face. A race driver’s reflexes and judgment require not a split second
but tenths of a second to make decisions. Pole positions are often decided by such fractional moments in time, but tonight the next move he made might be Bryce’s last.

  He stared at the purported Chinese journalist. He knew the gun. He had a Sig 365 compact just like it. Small, accurate, clips to carry 15 shots. He’d never seen one with a sound suppressor, though, and was intrigued.

  He knew that, even if he called out for the two security guards posted just twenty feet on the other side of the ornate door, the woman with the gun could put a decent amount of lead into his head before they had time to react. He thought it best to ride this one out and see where it took them. If she wanted him dead, he’d know soon enough.

  He started to speak but she raised her other hand and placed her index finger to her freshly painted red lips. Shhh. She gestured for him to sit down and then sat across from him while reaching for a pad of paper and pen on the coffee table. She switched the gun to her right hand and wrote with her left, then slid the pad across to Bryce as he leaned in to read it.

  He moved too quickly. Her hand extended the gun toward him again. At this range she couldn’t miss.

  WHY DOES THE CIA HAVE A BUG ON YOUR PHONE?

  She removed her ID from her small bag and held it out for him to see. Despite all that he had been through, this was the first time anyone had pointed a gun at him and was still breathing. Paris might be regarded as a romantic, beautiful city but for Bryce, sitting across from an armed Chinese agent from the MSS, Ministry of State Security, romance was the farthest thing from his mind.

  Whenever Pete Winters had drawn him into something risky, it had been in tight quarters. The training his uncle had given him, combined with what the CIA had taught him for close encounters, weren’t going to be of much help here. The suite was over 1600 square feet, bigger than the house he grew up in back in Vermont. The weapon was a good one and the woman with her finger on the trigger, who had played her role as a journalist, a deaf one at that, was deserving of a Golden Globe for best acting.