Riptide

sniff me
    out. That was when he killed that assistant of mine simply because
    he'd seen her with me and decided that she was my mistress. But I
    got away that time and he left, returned to Crete. We've learned he
    went to England a number of times, but he hasn't gone back there
    recently. Unofficially, he could have bounced in and out of the
    United States with a dozen different phony passports. Who in
    Greece would catch on to that? Or if they did, even care?"
    "Still, we have to assume that he was in Crete most of the time.
    For God's sake, he was married. He eventually had a kid with this
    woman. So he simply can't know his way around here all that
    well."

Thomas said, "Becca is right. He's a monster, no matter the excuses
    I make for the man I knew more than twenty years ago. Of
    course I didn't really know him. He was just a target to me, always
    on the opposite side, the black king to checkmate. Now we're
    forced to wait, to gnaw our elbows. Krimakov will find us, count
    on it.
    "Oh yeah,Tellie Hawley and Scratch Cobb are coming tomorrow
    morning to speak to Becca. Maybe that'll be good. I think she
    liked them both when she met them in New York. Maybe she'll remember
    more talking to them. They're pretty desperate, as you can
    well imagine. Hawley is eating himself alive with guilt. They were
    his agents, all four of them, and now they're dead."
    "Yes," Adam said, and streaked his fingers through his hair, sending
    it on end. "Since Savich found Krimakov's apartment in Iraklion,
    our people will go in. Just maybe they'll find something."
    Becca leaned her forehead against the closed door, listening to
    their voices as they moved off down the hall. She turned then and
    leaned back against the door, her arms crossed over her chest, just as
    Adam had done when he'd first come into her room. She closed her
    eyes.
    He'd murdered four more people. Like Thomas, she knew Krimakov
    would find them. It was as if he were somehow programmed
    to find Thomas and kill him. And her, too, of course. He
    would do anything, go anywhere, kill anyone in his way, to gain his
    objective.
    How could he have killed his wife and her two children, his
    stepchildren? And his own son was in a burn hospital in Switzerland.
    Had that one truly been an accident? No, there were no accidents
    when it came to Krimakov. It was beyond terrifying.
    She returned to her bed, curled up, hugging her arms around
    her knees. It was warm, very warm, but she was cold all the way to

her bone marrow. Suddenly, she heard her mother's voice, sharp
    with impatience, telling her that if she even considered going out
    with Tim Hardaway--that juvenile delinquent--she would lock
    her in a closet for a month. Now she smiled with the memory;
    then, at sixteen, she had believed her life was over. She wondered
    what her mother would think of Adam. She smiled, then shivered
    a bit, remembering that hard, fast kiss. Her mother, she thought,
    would love Adam.
    Suddenly, she heard a whispery sound. She jerked up in bed, her
    heart pounding, and looked toward the window. Again, that whispery
    brushing sound. Her heart pumping fast and faster now, she
    walked over and forced herself to look outside. There was an oak
    tree there, the end of one leaf-laden branch lightly brushing its
    leaves over the windowpane.
    But he was close, she knew that. On her way back to bed, she
    kept looking over her shoulder out the bedroom window. She
    didn't want to speak to any more agents. Oh God, just how close
    was he?
    How close?

    Now everyone in the world knew about Krimakov. Adam
    watched the old photograph of him flash on CNN and all the major
    networks. Then it was set beside the photograph the CIA artist
    had aged, showing what Krimakov would probably look like today.
    It was a fine job. With luck, it matched enough so he could be recognized.
    Becca hadn't remembered anything more, however, when
    she'd looked at the photos.
    Everyone wanted to interview Becca Matlock, but no one knew
    where she was.

The New York cops wanted to talk to her, but this time, she
    didn't have to put up with Letitia Gordon. The FBI had told them
    to stuff it after the murder of the four FBI agents in NYU Hospital.
    There was a lot of name-calling, a lot of rancor, but at least she
    wasn't in the middle of it now. She'd been lost in the shuffle. She
    was safe.
    As for Thomas Matlock, his identity had leaked quickly enough,
    but at least no one knew where he was, either. If there had been a
    leak, they