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“I guess the question is, do you want me to come with you?”
“I do. But I want you to do it because you know it’s the right thing.”
She looked down. He could see the confliction on her face. “I would help Uncle Slava if he was working for another cause, but I can’t support Russia. Not now.” She looked back up at him. “Just answer me this. How did you know I went back to the café?”
“Microexpressions.”
“When I saw him?”
“Your face transmitted the fact that you knew him. You covered it so fast I was certain this was important. I waited for some sign from you…but nothing came.”
Zoya finished the explanation for him. “So when I left you on the street, you doubled back to the café because you knew where I was going.”
“Went through the kitchen. Watched you through a window. You couldn’t see me because of the reflection.”
Zoya nodded. “What now?”
“We take a bus to Guatemala City. We stay there tonight and leave for Belize in the morning via private car.”
She nodded. “I know you think we might be under surveillance, but I swear to you, Dyadya Slava would not lie to me.”
Court just looked back out the window. His silence spoke volumes.
After a time she said, “There’s no one out there.”
Turning to head for the door, Court passed her by. Without looking at her, he said, “Humor me while we run an SDR anyway.”
A surveillance detection route was tradecraft-speak for moving in irregular patterns around an area to identify anyone who might be following. Both Zoya and Court had conducted thousands of these in their years of work in the shadows, and tonight would be…should be…no different.
Zoya didn’t respond to the American’s curt comment; she just followed him out the door.
They stepped into the hallway, then stopped next to a window overlooking the small rear parking court.
Court knelt down next to it. Carefully peering around the side, he saw that a milky white mist now hung in the cool highland air.
He scanned left to right over the space, taking in shapes, hunting for movement. The idling engine of a parked car, the glint of light from a flashlight, even an illuminated watch face, anything that stood out.
He saw nothing at first, but then he began to rise, revealing more of his body to the window, and suddenly he detected a shift in the darkness, possibly the wind but possibly something else.
Softly, he said, “Hold.”
Zoya reached into the daypack on her chest, put her right hand around the grip of the 9-millimeter Jericho she’d packed there. Court held a hand out to calm her, but his eyes remained focused on the rear parking area. A row of colorful bushes hung over a tin fence, casting shadows from the light on the pole above it. Finally, he said, “Got a figure in a black poncho back here. He’s mostly behind a tree, under the bushes by the fence. Can’t tell if he’s armed.”
Zoya hesitated, then asked, “A Guatemalan?”
“I don’t know.”
“Uncle Slava wouldn’t turn on me.”
Court said nothing to this. After a moment he said, “If this guy is a rear blocking force, that means others will be coming up the stairs, or via the balcony back in the room.”
She shook her head. “Or maybe he’s just a security guard, or a guy talking on his cell phone to his girlfriend outside his flat so his wife doesn’t hear.”
“Maybe,” he said softly.
He dropped low, took off his backpack, and scooted under the window. As Zoya did the same, Court pulled out his lock pick set and began working on the door to the apartment there. He’d noticed that the place was unoccupied when they arrived the other day, and he’d neither heard movement nor seen anyone coming or going since then.
In seconds he had the door open.
