Page 4 of Burn this City

He shook his head and stared at the street ahead. Some turns in this part of the drive required attention, and while the darkness allowed him to spot cars coming from the other direction from miles away, he didn’t want to hit a deer or other large animal. At least this last bit of the climb up into the hills felt more familiar. Forest at night was always the same, and the drive had stretched out much longer than he’d expected or even had been emotionally prepared for. He’d planned to come up with a solution on the way, but his thoughts were a jumbled mess that he couldn’t untangle while focused on night driving.

The gate opened and let both the Porsche and Mauro’s Beemer in. Another very short and much slower drive, and he parked the car at the side of the house. He couldn’t wait to get inside—the angular shapes beyond the trees looked like a friendly fortress now.

The Beemer’s tires crunched gravel as Mauro drove up close enough that Jack could have touched the car without extending his hand much. The window buzzed down. “Need a hand?”

Jack scoffed and opened the Porsche’s trunk. “I’ll manage.” What clothes he needed fit snugly into his overnight bag, along with his laptop.

“All right,” Mauro drawled and killed the engine. “Just a quick check.”

“Sure.” Jack led the way, unlocked the door and deactivated the alarm. He dropped his bags on the chair next to the fireplace and busied himself with starting a fire, while he listened to Mauro moving through the house, opening cupboards and doors. Since the house was almost an open floorplan with plenty of large windows and thus reflections, he didn’t even have to pay attention to know exactly where the soldier was.

Mauro returned. “Right, looks clean. Are you sure you’re going to be okay?”

Jack raised his eyebrows and tilted his head. “I packed enough socks, the bar is filled up, and Gino’s has delivered enough food to survive here for a couple of weeks.” He looked around demonstratively. “I’ll be fine.”

“You know the boss would prefer me staying here.”

“He also prefers blondes, and yet …” Jack smiled at Mauro’s beginning smirk. “Listen, you go home to Hannah. I’ll call if I need a pick-up or anything more dramatic happens than me running out of pasta. Which is unlikely. You know Gino’s.”

Mauro still didn’t seem convinced, so Jack shed his jacket and patted the gun holstered at his belt. “I can look after myself.”

It wasn’t like they were on enemy turf. This was one of the smaller villas up in the hills, and he was so rarely here he’d be astonished if anybody targeted him. He fully expected to go in a more traditional drive-by shooting, unless he returned to Memorial Bridge one night and ended things himself. But Mauro didn’t need to know any of this.

Mauro held his gaze for a couple of moments, then glanced toward the kitchen. “Gino’s, eh?”

“Definitely Gino’s,” Jack confirmed. “I’m taking a break, not starting a diet.”

“Good on you. And you’ll call?” Mauro looked around, as if checking whether he’d looked into all the rooms and corners, but the way his weight shifted betrayed that Jack had won the argument. Nobody was eager to pull boring guard duty when he could hang out with his crew or sleep next to his wife. This place offered solace to somebody like Jack, but the same peace and quiet held no appeal to somebody like Mauro.

“I’ll call.” He wasn’t going to add “I promise”—they weren’t that familiar with each other, and ultimately Jack was under no obligation to reassure a soldier. His aim was to get him out the door without worrying him too much. He’d struggled so hard to get the time away from the bustle of Port Francis, and constantly awaiting Andrea’s pleasure, and all those late-night phone calls. He needed this to clear his head and so Mauro needed to get the hell out.

“Well, I guess.” Mauro shrugged his heavy shoulders. “Nobody knows you’re here.”

“That too.”

And that was how he liked it. Andrea knew. A faceless housekeeper knew. After all, she’d taken delivery of the restaurant food, checked there was wood for the fire, and that all bed clothes and towels were fresh. But, to her, Jack was nothing but a rich guy from the city who wanted his vacation home ready for a few days. There were dozens like him with houses like this scattered around the hills. His name had never been mentioned, and a totally legitimate company was listed as the owner. Ah, anonymity. Priceless.

He stood and subtly herded Mauro back toward the front door. “Thanks, I’ll let you out.”

“All right.” Mauro nodded. “Have a good break.”

Jack breathed a sigh of relief when Mauro left. On the security screen, he followed the soldier’s progress down the natural stone path winding past manicured shrubs. Mauro was still watchfully gazing left and right until he’d reached the Beemer. On cue, Jack opened and then closed the gate for the car and then sagged against the wall in the corridor as if he’d sprinted a dozen miles without warm-up.

Restlessly, he walked through the house—it only had two floors. When he’d first bought the place three years ago, he’d briefly considered replacing the ornamental wall with its open doorway with a solid wall and door to add privacy for the downstairs master bedroom, but he’d decided against it. The house had never been meant to be shared. He wasn’t going to entertain anybody here, and he’d never had any use for the guest bedroom upstairs.

After he’d locked away his gun in the safe, he hung up the few clothes he’d brought in the spacious walk-in closet. Jack kept a few shirts and suits hanging, plus some workout clothes folded neatly on shelves, mostly so it felt less like an empty design hotel suite, but with little effect. Now he added the light woolen coat he’d worn to that collection. The architect had clearly intended for a couple to have plenty of space for their clothes, and Jack’s five suits, ten shirts, and three pairs of shoes drove home how poorly they filled it. Whoever had built the shelves had anticipated handbags, many more shoes, jewelry, suitcases and ties, and all the other stuff that accumulated over the years.

Jack placed his current book on the nightstand, then walked around the corner to the bathroom to drop off his toiletry bag. As much as the large shower beckoned, he ignored it for now—the thought of stepping out of steamy warmth onto cold stone with bare feet made him shudder. He switched on the underfloor heating so he could enjoy a long shower later to beat the lingering tension out of his muscles.

Upstairs, he placed his laptop on the large empty desk and plugged it in for tomorrow’s hard workday, though he’d likely get distracted by what the estate agent had called “his one-million-dollar view”—well, make that two million—over the flank of the hill and out to the ocean. As stunning as it was, he preferred the view from the living room, down the hill and over the bay. The house was mostly glass with a few wood and natural stone walls, but its real value was in the fact that it was also completely private. No neighbors could peer into his windows, and likewise he didn’t even catch a glimpse of other people’s properties. Unlike the other side of the bay, this area hadn’t been ruined with development, and further construction had been banned, adding another cool half million to the value of the house.

Of course, in deepest darkness, none of the views mattered. On a clear night, the landscape could be downright magical, especially when a full moon poured a silver pathway across the bay and the trees cast dark blue shadows. No moon tonight, though.

He still switched off all the lights, opened the double doors of the living rooms and stepped out into the night to enjoy the quiet, deeply breathing in the clean air that held a promise of fall. The season was about to turn, teetering between the overripe sluggishness of a radiant summer and the sobering chill of autumnal decay.

To his struggling peasant ancestors, fall had meant slaughter season, hunting season, with nature tightening the purse strings so only the strongest of her children would survive. They couldn’t have dreamed of the life he led now.

Ah, blessed silence. No phone calls, no people, just quiet hills, trees, sky, wind. Jack almost wished he were still a smoker to keep his hands busy and settle his nerves. Hell, in his youth he’d have added some weed to that, but these days marijuana only made him tired and hungry, and ultimately he could no longer afford the loss of control over his own thoughts. Better to stay in the here and now, settle into a kind of domestic vacation boredom that would be punctured with short bursts of intense work.

---