Fifth Ave 01 - Fifth Avenue (88 page)

“I have a lot of money,” he said to them both.
 
“Millions.
 
I’ll triple whatever Wolfhagen’s paying you.
 
Both of you can walk out of here right now and never have to do this again.
 
You’ll be set for life.
 
Just let me live.”
 

The woman’s lips, rouged red, broke into a half-smile.

“Millions,” Cole said.

She lifted the gun.

*
 
*
 
*

Six Months Later

Pamplona, Spain

Ever since he was a child, Mark Andrews wanted to run with the bulls.

As a boy in Boston, he would sit on his grandfather’s lap and listen to the old man’s stories of his days in Spain, when he was still young and single, and had traveled the world on the trust fund his father gave him upon graduating from Yale.
 

Mark would marvel at the man’s retelling of La Fiesta de San Fermin, the week-long orgy of bull worship that honored Pamplona’s patron saint San Fermin, who was martyred when bulls dragged his body through the city’s narrow, dusty streets.
 
Mark’s grandfather had run with the bulls.
 
He had stood among the thousands of men in white shirts and red sashes impatiently waiting for the first rocket--and then the second rocket--to signal their release.
 

Even then, some thirty years ago, in his parents’ home, Mark could hear the thunderous clacking of hooves as the twelve beasts came crashing down Calle Santo Domingo, through Plaza Consistorial and Calle Mercaderes, their horns sharp and deadly, their murderous rage focused on those foolish young men running blindly before them.

Now, at thirty-nine, Mark Andrews himself stood among fools in white shirts and red sashes, the early morning sun beating down on his face, the delicious anticipation of the impending event flooding his system.

Pamplona was a city gone mad.
 

All week long, fifty thousand people from around the world had participated in La Fiesta de San Fermin--known to the locals as Los Sanfermines.
 
They paraded drunkenly through the streets with towering, colorful
gigantes
, went to the afternoon bullfights, drank gallons of wine, made love in alleyways, and rose each morning from brief catnaps to watch the spectacular running of the bulls.
 

Earlier in the week, the mayor had kicked off the festivities at noon by lighting one of many rockets from the Ayuntamiento’s balcony.
 
And now, as Mark waited along with nearly a thousand other men for the rocket that would signal the beginning of
el encierro
, he watched and listened to the cheering crowd that looked down at him from open windows, wrought-iron balconies, the Santo Domingo stairs and from inside the Plaza de Toros itself.
 

Never had he felt more alive.
 
He would run as his grandfather had.

A hand was laid on his arm.
 
Mark turned and faced a stranger.

“Do you have the time?” the man asked.
 
“I left my watch at the hotel.
 
They should be firing the first rocket any minute now.”

Mark smiled, delighted to be in the company of a fellow American.
 
He checked his watch and said, “In a few minutes, we’ll be running like hell from twelve very pissed off bulls.”
 
He extended a hand, which the man shook.
 
“I’m Mark Andrews,” he said.
 
“From Manhattan.”

The man’s grip was firm, his teeth bright white when he smiled back.
 
“Vincent Spocatti,” he said.
 
“L.A.
 
What brings you here?”

“My grandfather,” Mark said.
 
“You?”

The man looked surprised.
 
“Hemingway,” he said, in a tone that implied there could be no other reason why he had traveled three thousand miles to be at this event.
 
“I even brought Lady Brett with me.”
 
He pointed down the barricaded street, toward a building where a young woman stood at a second-story balcony, her dark hair and white dress stirring in the breeze.
 
“That’s my wife, there,” he said.
 
“The one with the video camera.”

Mark looked up and caught a glimpse of the woman just as the first rocket tore into the sky to signal that the gates of the corral had been opened.
 

He felt a rush.
 
The sea of young Spaniards lurched forward.
 
A cheer went through the crowd and rippled down the narrow streets, reverberating off the stone walls, finally blooming in the Plaza de Toros itself.
 
Moments later, a second rocket sounded, warning the crowd that the six bulls and six steers had been released.
 

The chase--which usually lasted only two minutes--had begun.

Mark ran.
 
He heard galloping behind him, felt the earth trembling beneath his feet, and ran, knowing that if he stumbled, if he fell in the street, he would first be trampled by the men running behind him, and then by the 1,500-pound beasts themselves.

He moved quickly and easily, suddenly euphoric as he shot past the Calle La Estafeta and the Calle de Javier.
 
He thought fleetingly of his grandfather and wished he could have been here to see this.

The crowd of spectators was screaming.
 
Shouting.
 
The terrific pounding of hooves filled the morning air with the intensity of a million small explosions.
 
Mark shot a glance over his shoulder, saw his American friend, saw the crush of young men behind him--and saw the first bull rapidly closing the distance between them all.

He was delirious.
 
He was beyond happy.
 
He knew that not even the day he testified against Maximilian Wolfhagen could compare to the rush he experienced now.

He was nearing the Plaza de Toros when Spocatti, fan of Hemingway’s lost generation, reached out and gripped his arm.
 
Startled, his pace slowing for an instant, Mark looked at the man.
 
He was now running alongside him, his face flushed and shiny, his eyes a shade darker than he remembered.
 
Mark was about to speak when Spocatti shouted, “Got a message for you, Andrews.
 
Maximilian Wolfhagen sends his best.
 
Said he wants to thank you for ruining his life.”

And before Mark could speak, before he could even react, Vincent Spocatti plunged a small knife into his left side.
 
And then he did it again.
 
And then again, sinking the knife close to his heart.

Stunned, the pain excruciating, Mark stopped running.
 
He looked down at the knife jutting from his bloody chest and fell to his knees, watching in dazed silence as Spocatti leaped over one of the barricades and disappeared into the jumping, thrashing crowd.
 

Mark had fallen in the middle of the street.
 
Hundreds of men were darting past him, jumping over him, screaming as the animals drew near.
 
Knowing this was it, knowing this is how he would die, Mark pulled the knife from his chest, turned and faced the first bull as it loomed into sight and sank its lowered horns into his right thigh.

He was thrown effortlessly into the air, a rag doll tossed into the halo of his own blood, his right leg shattered, the bone jutting from the torn flesh.
 

He landed heavily on his side, so stunned that he was only dimly aware that he was being trampled.
 
A seemingly never-ending series of hooves dug into his face and arms and stomach.
 

The men rushing past him tried to move him out of the way, tried to grasp his shirt and pull him to safety, but it was impossible.
 
The beasts were upon them.
 
There was nothing anyone could do but watch in horror as twelve angry bulls and steers ripped apart an innocent man.

When it was over, Mark Andrews lay in the street--his body bruised and broken beyond recognition, his breathing a slow, clotted gasp.
 
He looked up at the narrow slit of blue sky that shined between the buildings on either side of him.
 

In the instant before his mind winked out, his failing eyesight focused on Lady Brett Ashley herself.
 
She was standing just above him on one of the building’s wrought-iron balconies, smiling as she filmed his death with the video camera held in an outstretched hand.

####