Cut and Run Read Online Free PDF Page B

furious and perhaps impossible to control. Technically, de Geer worked for Bloch, although as an independent his only loyalty was to himself. It was in his role as Bloch’s messenger that Ryder had first met the Dutchman. De Geer turned the screws on Ryder on the sergeant’s behalf—demanding more money, more favors, making those demands impossible to refuse. But now Ryder was the one turning the screws on the Dutchman.
    Still, Ryder knew that if he didn’t level with Bloch, the sergeant would keep digging until he found out what he wanted to know. Right now, Ryder didn’t need that kind of interference. He needed to keep Bloch where he was, at least for the moment. “Can’t you stall him?”
    â€œMe?” Otis gave a croaking laugh that ended in a fit of coughing. He slurped some coffee and settled back, his bony frame almost disappearing against the tall wooden back of the booth. “Shit, Sam, you got a sense of humor, huh? I don’t stall Bloch—man, nobody stalls that fucker. I try, I’m a dead man.”
    â€œMy God, what have I gotten myself into?”
    Ryder hadn’t intended for Otis to hear him, but the skinny army combat veteran nodded solemnly. “You know it, Sam, don’t you? Let me help, okay? Trust me, I know Bloch. Man, I ain’t going to let you go down.”
    My God, Ryder thought, am I so desperate I need Otis Raymond to protect me? “Thank you, Otis, but I can handle Bloch. Everything will work out.”
    â€œThat’s what you always say.”
    â€œIt will. Trust me. ”
    â€œI gotta give Bloch something.”
    â€œOf course. I understand that. Explain to him that Hendrik de Geer and I are meeting at Lincoln Center tomorrow night to discuss a plan to get Bloch enough money to purchase the weaponry he needs and to get into his permanent camp—and out of my life for good. That’s to his advantage as well as mine. Our current arrangement is too dangerous for us both.”
    Otis nodded at Ryder’s plate, and Ryder shook his head and pushed it over. “I ain’t had a good plate of eggs in I don’t know when. You should see the crap the sergeant feeds us. Granola, for chrissake. So, what kind of plan?”
    â€œI’d rather not say.”
    â€œMan, you gotta.”
    â€œLook—”
    â€œYou want Bloch at Lincoln Center, then you clamp up right now.”
    â€œThat’s the last thing I want!”
    Otis dug into Ryder’s cold eggs. “Then talk to me, Sam.”
    â€œI’m going after a diamond.” Ryder measured his words carefully, trying to ignore the grinding pain in the pit of his stomach. He was so afraid. Dear God, he was afraid. But everything would work out. “It’s the largest, most mysterious uncut diamond in the world.”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œAnd if I can get it—if—I intend to turn it over to one Master Sergeant Phillip Bloch.”

Three
    A young woman in a fresh white apron smiled across the counter in Catharina’s Bake Shop at the tiny dark-haired woman. “May I help you?”
    â€œYes,” Rachel Stein said, only vaguely aware that in this place, her faded Dutch accent seemed right. “I’m here to see Catharina Peperkamp—Fall, I mean.” It was impossible to think of Catharina married, with a child. “Catharina Fall.”
    â€œAnd who should I tell her is here?”
    â€œTell her Rachel.”
    It would, she believed, be enough.
    The waitress went back to the kitchen, and Rachel took a piece of broken butter cookie from a sample basket on the counter. For many years when she was young, she’d often been mistaken for a child, but now, with deep lines etched into her forehead and around her serious mouth and small, straight nose, people thought she was an old lady when she was only sixty-five. She’d gone from looking too young to looking too old. Her cab driver had offered to help her