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Back Balance of Power Save as PDF
Chapters (53)
  1. BALANCE OF POWER
  2. Acknowledgments
  3. About The Creators
  4. ONE
  5. TWO
  6. THREE
  7. FOUR
  8. FIVE
  9. SIX
  10. SEVEN
  11. EIGHT
  12. NINE
  13. TEN
  14. ELEVEN
  15. TWELVE
  16. THIRTEEN
  17. FOURTEEN
  18. FIFTEEN
  19. SIXTEEN
  20. SEVENTEEN
  21. EIGHTEEN
  22. NINETEEN
  23. TWENTY
  24. TWENTY-ONE
  25. TWENTY-TWO
  26. TWENTY-THREE
  27. TWENTY-FOUR
  28. TWENTY-FIVE
  29. TWENTY-SIX
  30. TWENTY-SEVEN
  31. TWENTY-EIGHT
  32. TWENTY-NINE
  33. THIRTY
  34. THIRTY-ONE
  35. THIRTY-TWO
  36. THIRTY-THREE
  37. THIRTY-FOUR
  38. THIRTY-FIVE
  39. THIRTY-SIX
  40. THIRTY-SEVEN
  41. THIRTY-EIGHT
  42. THIRTY-NINE
  43. FORTY
  44. FORTY-ONE
  45. FORTY-TWO
  46. FORTY-THREE
  47. FORTY-FOUR
  48. FORTY-FIVE
  49. FORTY-SIX
  50. FORTY-SEVEN
  51. FORTY-EIGHT
  52. FORTY-NINE
  53. FIFTY

Ramirez sat back. He drew long and contentedly on his cigar. "This is excellent, gentlemen. And once everything is in place, our task is simply to maintain the pressure until the middle and lower classes buckle. Until the Basques and the Castilians, the Andalusians and the Galicians acknowledge that Spain belongs to the people of Catalonia. And when they do, when the prime minister is forced to call for new elections, we will be ready." His small, dark eyes moved from face to face before settling on the leather binder before him. "Ready with our new constitution-ready for a new Spain."

The other men nodded their approval. Miguel and Rodrigo applauded lightly. Ramirez felt the weight of history past and history yet to come on his shoulders, and it felt good.

He was unaware of a disheveled man who sat an eighth of a mile away with a different sense of history on his shoulders-and a much different weapon at his disposal.

FOUR

Monday, 7:15 p.m.

Madrid, Spain

Aideen was still sitting in the leather couch when Comisario Diego Fernandez arrived. He was a man of medium height and build. He was clean-shaven with a ruddy complexion and carefully trimmed goatee. His black hair was longish but neat and he peered out carefully from behind gold-rimmed spectacles. He wore black leather gloves, black suede shoes, and a black trenchcoat. Beneath the open coat was a dark gray business suit.

An aide shut the door behind him. When it had clicked shut, the inspector bowed politely to Aideen.

"Our deepest sympathy and apologies for your loss," he said. His voice was deep, the English accent thick. "If there's anything I or my department can do to help you, please ask."

"Thank you. Inspector," Aideen said.

"Be assured that the resources of the entire Madrid metropolitan police department as well as other government offices will be applied to finding whoever was responsible for this atrocious act."

Aideen looked up at the police inspector. He couldn't be talking to her. The police department couldn't be looking for the killer of someone she knew. The TV announcements and newspaper headlines wouldn't be about a person she had been dressing with in a hotel room just an hour before. Though she had lived through the killing and seen Martha's body on the street, the experience didn't seem real. Aideen was so accustomed to changing things-rewinding a tape to see something she'd missed or erasing computer data she didn't need-that the irreversibility of this seemed impossible.