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She shook her head, not following. “What about me?”
“She knows Niki is a Russian spy. You introduced her to Niki. You and Niki are friends. Does she suspect—?”
“Absolutely not.”
“How can you be sure?”
“If she suspected me, Gora, she would have booked the first flight out of here. Instead, she came to me. She thinks Niki gulled me as well as her. We’re friends; she trusts me.”
“You’d better be right.” He pushed aside both plates and gave her the cool, appraising look she hated. “Did it ever occur to you that she’s been working you?”
“What? No. Not for a minute. I know her too well.”
“None of us know anyone else. Isn’t that the first lesson we learn in the field?”
She said nothing, folded her arms across her chest.
“Wait a minute.” Gora struck his forehead with the heel of his hand. “How was I so stupid? How did I not see it?”
“See what?”
“You and this woman, this Morgana Roy.” He rose from the table and stepped toward her, torso inclined aggressively. “You really are friends. You care about her.”
“Don’t be ridiculous.” A ball of ice had formed in the pit of her stomach.
Her brother’s eyes were gleaming darkly. “I know your secret now, Alyoshka. The one you would never tell me. You’ve made the mistake all novice field agents are trained to avoid.”
“You’re babbling, Gora.” But she felt a kind of panic rising up inside her.
“You’ve become involved with your mark.”
She shook her head, a weak response, to be sure.
“You’ve come to see her as a person, you care about her well-being.” He clucked his tongue against the roof of his mouth. “How you’ve weakened yourself. Sis.” He raised a forefinger. “We shall have to do something about that. Otherwise…”
The cotton ball of panic had reached the back of her throat, and she almost gagged. “Otherwise what?” she managed to get out.
“Otherwise, you’ll be of no use to me.”
She felt the silence between them like a straitjacket. She found herself in a place she did not like, with no exit.
Gora tapped his lips with a finger, a quick pattern, like a silent song’s beat. “Here’s what we’ll do.” The glimmer of his smile turned her bones cold. “You’ll get your friend to do it herself.”
“Do what herself?”
“Don’t be dense, Alyoshka. You’ll get her to dispose of our liability.”
“Who? Niki?” She was aghast. “He’s the head of spetsnaz now, for God’s sake. You’re crazy.”
Gora grinned. “Crazy like a Russian bear. Konstantin appointing him was simply a power play aimed at his brother. I know that. You know that. Every-fucking-body knows that. Just as they know that it’s far too dangerous for the head of spetsnaz to be in the field.” He shrugged. “Konstantin violated the rules of the game. When his chess piece gets taken off the board he only has himself to blame. We weaken Konstantin, we’re free of blame, and we clear the field for you to slip into Niki’s old position, make his contacts yours.” He chuckled. “That is, ours.”
“Huh. And how exactly am I to do that? I doubt Morgana’s ever even held a gun.”
“All the better,” her brother said. “Niki will never suspect her until she pulls the trigger, and by then it’ll be too late.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
Gora cleared the dishes, stacking them in the small stainless-steel sink. “Simple,” he said, “you’ll put her in a situation where she has no other option.”
Just like me, Françoise thought in despair.
—
Everybody knows that in the field the best-laid plans are sometimes undone by the simplest of human quirks which, no matter how one tries, cannot be anticipated. Everybody knows no plan is airtight. Everybody knows it can all go sideways, but the plans are made nevertheless because in the field the dice are rolled and the chances are taken. There is no other way.
And so, what everybody knows, everybody conveniently forgets.
One of these unforeseen human quirks had occurred the previous night, when Morgana told Françoise what she had learned about Larry London. When they parted ways, both women to their hotel rooms, Morgana could not sleep. After switching off the light, tossing and turning on a roiling sea of anxiety, she relit her bedside lamp. When reading didn’t help, she got out of bed, dressed, and stood by the window, looking out at the street below, just as she had as a kid when high fevers made sleep impossible. Watching the wind in the willows, the play of moonlight on the brushlike branches, soothed her more effectively than a cold compress across her brow. In this urban setting, the streetlights, the occasional passing car, the lamps blinking in mysterious conversation along the marina wharf, did the same. And she stood there, her mind starting to relax as the night staggered to its end and light returned to the world.
A short time later, she spotted Françoise hurrying out of the hotel. She crossed the street, heading toward the marina. Curious where her friend might be going at this ungodly hour, she slipped out of her room, ran down the stairs, and out the front door, following in Françoise’s urgent footsteps.
She ducked behind the corner of a building as Françoise turned to look over her shoulder. For upward of twenty minutes Françoise appeared to do nothing but survey the area. Why then had she been in such a hurry? Morgana wondered. She hesitated, awash in guilt. What was she doing, following a friend, the woman who had moved heaven and earth to free her from the clutches of the NSA? And yet, she found her feet moving forward, as if of their own volition. Curiosity killed the cat, she thought. But it created a terribly strong impulse, one that wouldn’t be denied.
At length, she saw Françoise heading along one of the wooden walkways. Boats rocked gently in their slips, rigging snapped, far off a buoy clanged. All soft sounds. Morgana, still partially in hiding, observed that Françoise stopped in front of the slip where a boat named Carbon Neutral was tied up. Two burly, rough-looking men with Slavic faces guarded the gangway. One of them barred her way, but the other appeared to know her, for he beckoned to her.
Françoise stepped aboard with the alacrity and confidence that could only come from having been on Carbon Neutral before. What in the world could she be up to? Something stirred inside her, a cool, slithery thing that raised questions along with its head.
Moments later, she saw the guard who had recognized Françoise escorting a young blond woman off the boat. Her hair was uncombed, her makeup smeared. Her ultra-short skirt and her ultra-high heels marked her out as a prostitute. With a little cry, she ripped her arm away from the guard’s grip, turned her back on him, strode unsteadily away. Morgana marked her drunken progress along the walkway, and when she was almost at the end, where the wooden wharf met the concrete dock, Morgana decided on a course of action.
She waited until the blonde was out of sight of the two men guarding Carbon Neutral, then started on her trajectory. As she neared the blonde she increased her speed until, glancing fearfully over her shoulder, she ran right into her.
“Oh, my God, I’m so sorry,” she said as she helped the blonde back onto her feet.
“Shit’s sake! What’s the matter with you, anyway?” the blonde all but snarled. “Idiot! Why don’t you look where you’re going?”
Morgana put on an apologetic face. “Well, I would have, except for the man who was trying to grab me.”
As Morgana had calculated, this little tidbit immediately reversed the blonde’s demeanor. “What?”
“It happened back there.” Morgana gestured vaguely toward the streets. “I was on my way home after, you know, a long night with…” She cleared her throat. “A guy I met in a bar. I was drunk, not thinking clearly. I was almost at my hotel when this guy grabbed me. When he started to pull me into an alley I kicked him in the balls and ran like hell.”
The blonde nodded, captured her unruly hair, which
the sea breeze kept blowing into her face, deftly twisted it into a knot at the top of her head. “I know exactly how you feel.” She unbuttoned her shirt halfway down so Morgana could see the deep bruise darkening between her breasts. “Something of the kind happened to me this morning.”
Morgana squeezed her shoulder in sympathy. “I’d say what we both need is some strong coffee and a good breakfast. What d’you say?” She held out her hand. “My name’s Morgana.”
The blonde took her hand briefly but energetically. “Natalie,” she said. “And, I don’t know about you, but I’d love a jigger or two of liquor in my coffee.”
—
Down by the marina, soldiers appeared in full camo, helmets, carrying submachine guns across their chests. They were members of the Skaraborg Armored Regiment and an odd sight indeed. Morgana asked Natalie about them, but she had no idea why they might be deployed.
The two women sat across from each other in a small, dark café near the water. It smelled of stale beer and staler sweat, but it was the only place open at this hour. Morgana did not want to take Natalie to her hotel restaurant for fear of running into either Larry or Françoise.
The door kept opening, fishermen coming in straight off their boats, reeking of the sea, scales making tiny rainbows on their slickers as they caught the light. Usually, the banter between the men was lighthearted and inevitably salty, punctuated with raucous laughter. But this morning, as if echoing Morgana’s mood, the atmosphere was tight with tension. What banter began petered out quickly and morosely.
“His name is Gora, that much I know for sure,” Natalie said. “And he’s Russian. I know a little. He spoke to his guards in Russian.”
Russian, Morgana thought. Dear God.
The smoked fish and thin triangles of dark bread Morgana had ordered were already half gone. The stink of fish no longer bothered her; she was adjusting to her new life.
Natalie stirred enormous amounts of sugar into her black coffee, the café’s only substitute for liquor. “And the woman was Russian, too.”
Morgana felt the muscles in her shoulders and neck tense. Her head came up like a pointer scenting prey. “What woman?”
Natalie made a face. “A woman came in while Gora was fixing us breakfast. Very beautiful. Gora’s demeanor changed as soon as she appeared. He stiffened, became an iceman. He had no more use for me. He began to trash-talk me. Then he kicked me out.”
These details rushed past Morgana like a runaway freight train. “You said the woman was Russian. How do you know that?”
“Gora spoke to her in Russian.”
“But—”
“Morgana, I know enough Russian to understand. He spoke to her as one intimate to another, nothing formal about it.”
Morgana’s throbbing heart was already sinking in her breast, but just to make sure, she said, “Can you describe this woman?”
Natalie had a keen eye, that much was clear after only fifteen seconds. But even if she hadn’t, Morgana would have recognized Françoise from the description. Of course it was Françoise. Morgana had been watching; no other woman had gone anywhere near Carbon Neutral.
She needed not to think about Françoise for a moment, give herself a little time to recover from the stunned reverberations this revelation had caused deep inside her. She turned her attention to the subdued conversations around them. She still had only a bare-bones understanding of Swedish, so she asked Natalie to listen in and translate for her.
After several minutes of concentration, with her expression seemingly darkening each second, Natalie said: “Now I understand the military presence. The MSB—that’s the Civil Contingency Agency—has ordered local governments countrywide to establish operations centers in underground bunkers, maintain a network of emergency sirens, and to coordinate with Swedish Armed Forces.” She stared at Morgana. “We’re being asked to prepare for a conflict with Russia.”
Morgana’s thoughts were in total disarray. She had hoped that taking her mind off her own problem would help settle her, get her over the shock. But now this. But whereas Natalie had to consider the bigger picture, she needed to concentrate on her own situation first, which was precisely this: Larry London wasn’t Larry London. Françoise Sevigne wasn’t Françoise Sevigne. How could she be so blind, why hadn’t she seen that the moment Larry was exposed Françoise was suspect as well? The answer was clear enough: emotion. She liked Françoise. A lot. They had been friends for some time, shared intimate moments. They had laughed together, shopped together; they’d even, on occasion, shared clothes. Good Christ, she thought. What have I gotten myself into?
Natalie put down her coffee cup, placed her hand over Morgana’s. “Your face has lost all color. Is everything all right?”
“I’m perfectly fine.” Morgana smiled like the porcelain doll she’d adored as a child. “Never better.”
31
The TV, set to CNN, was muted. Nevertheless, the scroll at the bottom told the breaking story of Russian military forces moving toward the borders of Estonia, Latvia, Belarus—with which the current Kremlin regime had an economic accord but no formal alliance—and already pushing farther into Ukraine. This in addition to the troops and war matériel inside Syria. Despite the Russian Sovereign’s claims that all maneuvers were simply part of war games, all this bellicose activity was sending NATO into a frenzy, especially since the new American president seemed indifferent to the threat. Events that had been long simmering appeared to be coming to a head.
Mala turned away from her contemplation of the news. “Whatever the Bourne Initiative is, do you think it could be tied in to the Sovereign’s far more aggressive stance?”
“I think it’s highly likely, which is why we’ve no time to waste in getting to Dima. According to General MacQuerrie, Dima Orlov took advantage of the chaos following Boris’s murder to hijack the cyber weapon.” Bourne wasn’t looking at the screen, but nor was he looking at her.
“You’re angry with me,” Mala said.
“I didn’t say anything to that effect.”
“You didn’t have to.”
“I don’t know how you can do the bidding of a man who tortured you,” Bourne said. “I don’t know how you can keep doing his bidding when I saved you from him.”
They were lying on a bed in a chain hotel room on the fringes of Dulles International Airport. Bourne had called his old friend, Deron. After sending him photos of Mala and himself, they were awaiting Deron’s messenger with new passports. Bourne still had his prosthetics; he had cut Mala’s hair and she had dyed it jet-black. They had checked into the hotel under the names Arnold and Mary Winstead, the same names that would be on the new passports; Bourne had paid cash, in advance.
The color scheme was ocher and brown, the room in dire need of refurbishing. Lights from the control tower periodically swept through the window, passing across the opposite wall. It was a depressing place, though both had been in far worse. For the moment, though, it was home.
“You took me away from him,” she said softly. “But you didn’t save me from him.”
He reached around her, felt along the lines of the ritual scars on her back. “The incantation will only work if you believe in it.”
Her eyes, lit with an inner fire, searched his face. “I do believe in it, Jason.”
“Why?”
“I have no choice.”
“There’s always a choice. You still have free will.”
She seemed to sink into herself, to ruminate deeply on the problem. As she did so, her countenance darkened. Rain spat against the window.
“You have no idea what I have, what I don’t have.”
“Then tell me.”
She smiled, sadly, wistfully, ruefully. No one else he’d ever encountered could encompass so many emotions with a simple curl of the lips.
“No,” Bourne said. “You’re going to have to do better than that.”
“Then you’ll have to do better.” She reached for him. “This is to be our lingua fra
nca now, the currency with which we do business.”
He held her at bay, shook his head. “Mala, don’t.”
She tossed her head. “Why not? I’ve dreamed of this moment, why should I not have it?”
“Why? Because I don’t want it.”
“It’s the one thing you’ve withheld from me. And I want it.”
He got up off the bed, moved away from her. He did not want her to touch him. “What you want is wrong, Mala. You must know that.”
“I don’t care,” she raged.
“I know that.” He said it calmly, softly, as if gentling her.
Abruptly, she turned away from him, but not before he saw that she was silently weeping.
—
Four Harleys by the side of the road, a man and a woman to ride two of them.
Hours ago, they had said good-bye to Arthur Lee and Jimmy Lang. Arthur had wanted to accompany them all the way back to D.C., but Bourne had reminded him that, considering the carnage, the best thing for both of them was to return to their respective homes as quickly as possible and resume their normal lives as if nothing had happened. Jimmy had concurred, and in the end, Arthur had conceded the point.
Bourne’s next objective was to get himself and Mala into Russia as swiftly and efficiently as possible, while keeping so far under the radar they wouldn’t be picked up by any clandestine organization; he was still acutely aware that both the Americans and the Russians were hunting him.
Keyre’s transport plane was awaiting him, refueled and maintenanced, but the pilot and crew had orders to bring Bourne back to Somalia, so using it was out of the question. Bourne did not want Keyre to know where they were going, and while he couldn’t be with Mala 24/7 to ensure she wouldn’t contact the Somali magus herself, at least he’d had her destroy her mobile.
So while Arthur and Jimmy took the license tags off Arthur’s truck, then climbed into Jimmy’s vehicle, Bourne and Mala had taken possession of two of the motorcycles, the pairs setting off in opposite directions. On the way, Bourne had called Deron with his requests. Still in rural Virginia, he had withdrawn money from one of his many accounts under assumed names in banks throughout the world. They shopped for new clothes, and while Bourne purchased a pair of scissors, Mala chose the black hair dye color. Around three in the afternoon, he’d checked them into the chain hotel.
