Riptide

didn't. He was lucky there and he got her.
    "I hate to say this, but I firmly believe he'll evade capture. He
    knows I'll be at the center of things, trying to figure out how to get
    him. He'll come to Washington. He's going to try to find Becca
    and me. He's got nothing else to do."
    "I still can't figure out why he threw Becca out of his car in
    New York. He had her. He could have announced it and had you
    knocking on his door to try to save her. But he let her go. Why?
    Shit, I'm making myself crazy. But if he's as smart as you say he is,
    he won't come down here, at least not yet, not until things cool
    down a bit."
    "There's one thing I am sure about now, Adam. I'm his reason
    for living, probably his only reason now. That's why he's leaving a
    trail of death. He doesn't care about himself anymore. He just
    wants me dead. And Becca, too. I'm thinking that Becca should
    head out to Seattle or maybe even Honolulu."
    "Yeah, right. You be the one to convince her of that, okay? She's
    just found you. You believe for a single second that she'd just pull
    out now, be willing to say sayonara to the father she just met?"
    "Probably not." Thomas sighed. "She's still so wary of me. It's
    like she can't make up her mind whether to hug me or shoot me
    for leaving her and her mother."
    "I'm thinking she wants to do both. At least now you two are
    together. The rest will come, Thomas, just be patient. For God's
    sake, she's known you for twenty-four hours."

"You're right, of course. But--never mind. Jesus, Krimakov just
    went right in there and killed everyone," Thomas said. "Everyone,
    without hesitation. To flush me out that first time, he released
    Becca. I can't imagine what he'd do to her now that she's with me.
    Well, yes I can. He'd kill her with no more remorse than when he
    killed all the others. And yes, there's no doubt in my mind that he
    believes she's with me now. Damnation, he had a silencer on the
    gun, Adam."
    "Yes."
    "Agent Marlane had six shots pumped into her. He saw that the
    male agent wasn't me, knew he'd been set up, and went berserk.
    Dell Carson, the agent playing me, had his gun out, but he didn't
    have time to fire. Neither did Agent Marlane."
    "Yes. I know."
    "How the hell did he get away? Hawley had undercover folk
    stationed all over that floor and the exits."
    Adam shook his head. "His disguise must have been something
    else. Maybe he even dolled himself up as a woman. Who knows?
    Do you remember if Krimakov did disguises back then?"
    Thomas leaned against the corridor wall, his arms crossed over
    his chest. "No. But it's been so many years, Adam, too many. What
    troubles me, and I know I can't let it, is that Becca just can't be sure
    that the guy who took her, the guy on the phone to her, was
    older." Thomas shook his head. "Another thing. Vasili was fluent in
    English, but I've read the transcripts of the conversations he had
    with Becca. It sounds so unlike him. And what he wrote, what he
    said to her, what he did. Calling himself her boyfriend, murdering
    Linda Cartwright, then digging her up, smashing her face, all as a
    sick joke to drive Becca over the edge. That's the behavior of a psychopath,
    Adam. Krimakov wasn't a psychopath. He was supremely
    arrogant, but as sane as I was."

"Whatever Krimakov was back then, he's changed," Adam said.
    "Who knows what's happened to him during the past twenty years?
    Don't forget all those killings: a second wife, two children, the guy
    whose password he used to get into the computer system to expunge
    all his personal data, killing someone to fake his own accidental
    death in that car accident. How many more we don't know
    about? And that brings up another question. You said that you believe
    you're now his only focus, his purpose for living. What about
    his son? He's in that burn clinic in Switzerland. He doesn't care
    about him anymore? Or maybe that wasn't an accident, either, and
    he tried to kill him, too?"
    "I don't know."
    Adam said, "Hell, maybe he was always over the top and he's just
    gotten more so, and maybe that goes to explain why he appears not
    to be worrying about his son. No, Thomas, don't argue with me.
    He's now here--in a foreign country to him--no longer in Crete.
    He's on our turf, and he probably hasn't been here for all that long."
    "Listen, Adam, we don't know that. Officially, Vasili Krimakov
    hasn't come into this country in the past fifteen years. He was here
    once back in the mid-eighties, checking around, trying to