CHAPTER 56
CHAPTER
THERE WAS NO MOTORCADE THIS time.
There was only an ultramodern and spacious helicopter that made a landing on a wide patch of grass on the rear grounds of Steers’s estate. The bushes around the chopper were nearly flattened by the blades’ wash.
Nash watched all this from an open doorway that led into the rear of the house.
The chopper was a Mercedes-Benz Eurocopter EC145. He googled the aircraft and found that the starting price was around nine million bucks.
Okay.
He was sure that Steers was watching the arrival, too, probably from the window of her office.
The chopper’s engine wound down and the rear door opened.
Only one man got out of the EC145, which could carry ten passengers plus two pilots.
He was of medium height with slicked-back dark hair.
His suit was quietly expensive. His manner was unhurried, Nash observed, and he did not seem impressed by the estate’s lavish home and grounds.
Though they were costly and luxurious, this man might be used to something still more costly and even more luxurious.
And he didn’t need an army of armed men around him, it seemed. Which was even more impressive than the cartel entourage, for perhaps an unobvious reason.
This man is unafraid that anyone will attempt him harm because they will know that the consequences will far outweigh the benefits.
That was a rarefied position to be in, and one that clearly not even Steers enjoyed.
Nash stepped out of the shadows and said, “Welcome, sir. Right this way. She is waiting for you.”
“Thank you,” the man replied politely.
As Nash led him inside, the newly recruited security team lurked in the shadows. They had no idea who this person was. Indeed, Nash did not recognize him, either, which meant nothing, really. He didn’t keep a mental dossier of global criminals in his memory.
They walked up the stairs and down the hall to Steers’s office. Nash knocked once and received the command to enter. He got the visitor settled, nodded at Steers, and withdrew. He took up his post outside her office door and placed his AirPods in. His bug was behind a book on her shelf.
And so it began.
* * *
“Thank you for coming,” said Steers to her visitor as he sat down, but she remained standing. She had on a milk-white tunic with Mandarin script running down one side of her top and done in a bright red, and black slacks.
“I had business in the vicinity, you see, such that it worked out,” replied the man. “I also understand that you had other visitors some time back. I trust that the meeting was successful?”
“They believe that it was,” said Steers. “And I believe that it was as well. But I do not think our respective beliefs stem from the same reasons.”
“That is intriguing enough to justify my visit.” He glanced at her clothes and the Mandarin characters. “‘The spirit of one can walk through fire’?” he translated.
“I find it both inspirational and true, do you not?”
“I do not know, Ms. Steers. I have never walked through fire.”
“But I have, quite literally.”
He nodded. “And may I say that the skillful extraction of your mother from her accommodations in Myanmar was truly something to behold.”
“That is a compliment I will treasure. However, I would have hoped that her replacement would have been allowed to die a dignified death. She had no blame in this.”
“There is always blame to parcel out,” he countered.
“But do not distress yourself in the least. She did die in peace and dignity. Her head was therefore of no more use to her. And its receipt by you, I thought, was also beneficial. To you and to me. It provided information that needed to be. . .received.”
“Your message was powerful. I trust it must have been a coincidence that it came about the same time that an attempt was made on my life. An attempt that would have succeeded except for the actions of the man who escorted you in here.”
“He looked capable enough. And your line of work does encourage such things, Ms. Steers. As it does to us all. We must always be on our guard.”
“Not all of us,” she said. “You come here with no security, but you know that you are perfectly safe with me.”
“As you say, I know that I am. . .perfectly safe with you.”
She sat, clasped her hands, and set them on the desk.
To anyone who knew Steers well, and there were almost none who really fit that criteria, she appeared calm and in control.
She was actually none of these things. The man across from her was far more dangerous than the most dangerous of her cartel partners.
He was no mere global criminal. And while he, despite what she had intimated to her other business colleagues, was not the head of an entire country, he was perhaps something more than that.
He had heads of countries—all of them powerful and ruthless—beholden to him.
That was why she knew that he had not ordered her death when Hao had attempted to end her life. If that had been the case, none of them would have been left alive.
Which means, of course, that I have a living traitor in the ranks.
“Our business arrangement has reached a crossroads, I think,” she said.
“Well, with your mother back to advise you, I trust you now speak from a position of superior strength, Ms. Steers.”
“You do me a great honor. And one reason I asked you here today was to explain why I did what I did with my mother. During my visit I became aware of her frailty. I did not wish her to die alone there in such a state.”
“A most understandable reaction from a daughter,” said the man graciously, but with a blank expression that ratcheted Steers’s defenses even higher.
“I felt this was not something that you and I could come to terms on. The action I undertook was the only avenue I perceived that I possessed. My mother has received medical attention and is doing much better. I trust she has many more years left.”
“How wonderful. Now to be clear, I neither appreciate nor condone what you did. It is bad for business. My business. If one can think they can freely take what is mine?” He spread his hands and smiled, an expression that did not come close to reaching his eyes.
“Then I have no business. You, as an exemplary businessperson yourself, must understand this.”
“I do.”
“So where does that leave. . .us?”
“With my mother back and my father long dead, it gives me great reason to reflect on the future. I have no children. I am the last of the Steerses.”
“And what have you concluded with your reflections, Ms. Steers?”
“That I want to sell my business to you.”
The man hiked his eyes in some mild surprise. “All of it?”
“All of it.”
“And the price?” he said, his expression becoming amused. “An astronomical sum, I am certain. You know something of the level of my wealth. You will take advantage, I am sure.”
Steers stared directly at him. “The amount I wish for myself is. . .one American dollar.”