Stone - 25 - Collateral Damage

him.
    “My name is Sheba,” the woman said, locking the door. “Please come through.”
    They left the handsome reception room and went into the rear of the building, where hairdressers’ booths were set up, then through a door off the larger room. “This is my private room,” Sheba said, waving her to the chair. “Let’s talk about what you need.” She stood behind Jasmine and looked at her in the mirror while she talked.
    “I want it shorter, but not too short,” Jasmine said. “Do you think I have the skin for blond hair?”
    “I have the perfect blond shade for your skin,” Sheba replied. “With blonder highlights. You’ll love it.”
    “I’m in your hands, then,” Jasmine said.
    “Come, let me wash your hair.”
    Jasmine moved to the other chair and lay back, resting her neck on the shaped edge of the sink while Sheba gently shampooed and rinsed her hair.
    Sheba dried it with a towel, then moved her client back to the other chair and began to cut it quickly, shaping as she went. Finally, she stopped. “How’s that for length?” she asked.
    “Excellent,” Jasmine replied.
    “Now let’s begin on the color.”
    —
    The president looked at his watch. “Good God!”
    “Time flies when you’re having fun,” Kate said.
    “I was going to read through my speech again before bedtime,” Will said, “but the hell with it. It can wait until breakfast.” He got to his feet.
    “Thanks so much for keeping my wife off the streets,” he said, “and for the promise of work for her later. I’ve always told her she’d have to support me in my old age.”
    “We’re looking forward to having her aboard,” Mike said.
    “And I was looking forward to having her to myself,” Will said. “So much for that.”
    “Oh, I think I can work you into my schedule,” Kate said. They walked up the stairs, and Will produced a cell phone and pressed a button. “Now,” he said.
    Stone opened the front door and looked up and down the block. All was quiet, only a couple of Secret Service men standing by. Then, from around a corner, a procession of four black SUVs drove slowly into the block and stopped.
    Everybody shook hands with Will and kissed Kate, and they were gone.
    “Come on back to the study for a brandy,” Stone said.
    “You two boys besot yourselves,” Holly said. “I’m hitting the sack—nothing but big days ahead.” She disappeared into the elevator.
    Stone and Mike went back to the study and found cognac.
    “Well, that was a surprise,” Mike said, “Kate’s blurting it out like that. I thought she’d take weeks to think it over.”
    “She knows her husband very well,” Stone said. “She took the moment.”
    “I’m delighted she did.”
    “So am I. She’s a remarkable person, and she’ll fit right into the board.”
    “I’m going to go after Holly, too,” Mike said. “But for an executive position, not the board, and not just yet.”
    “You won’t get an argument from me,” Stone said, “and I think she’ll want it. When Kate goes, she’ll be adrift in the Agency. She doesn’t have the stature yet to be director, and the alternative is to go back to work for Lance Cabot again, and she’s been there, done that.”
    “Pretty much what I figured,” Mike said, raising his glass.
    —
    Jasmine sat in the chair and looked at her new hairstyle and color. “It’s perfect,” she said.
    “Perfection is what we deal in,” Sheba replied. “The change in the eyebrows will help give you a new appearance, too. As it is, you look nothing like the person in the flyers that are all over town.”
    So she knew whom she was dealing with, Jasmine thought. She stood up. “How much do I owe you?” she asked, reaching for her purse.
    “One hundred thousand dollars,” Sheba replied calmly. “Our special price for fugitives.”
    Jasmine laughed. “And worth every penny,” she said. If she wanted that much now, what would she demand when the reward was offered? She reached into her purse, and her hand closed on the butt of the Walther PPK, silencer fitted. In one easy motion, she turned, raised the little pistol, and fired into Sheba’s face. A small hole appeared on one side of her forehead, and blood trickled down her face.
    Sheba looked astonished, and seemed to be trying to speak, but she didn’t fall; she clutched at a countertop to steady herself.
    Jasmine shot her in the head again, and Sheba collapsed in a heap at her feet.
    —
    Back in the car, Habib spoke.