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When the ambassador’s eyes filled with tears, I turned away, wanting to give him and Schön some semblance of privacy.
“Should I ask those in the coalition to forgive me for accepting the gift of my education?” she said to him.
“Of course you shouldn’t. But it is not the same.”
“It is the same, Uncle. If anything, it’s because of you that AMPS, as we know it, will finally be taken down. Had you not started the coalition, the team assembled, who I believe are the best agents in the world, would never have begun this fight collectively.”
He bowed his head. “Thank you, niece.”
An hour later, the twelve agents deploying on the op loaded into three SUVs headed to the airfield at Gatwick, bound for Gozo.
25
SCHÖN
Asense of calm came over me the moment I walked out the door of the command center. I knew what I had to do, and I’d deliver. It was that simple.
No one had said it, at least not in my presence, but I think we all prayed Francesca Vella was innocent in all of this. Bexli more than anyone, since she credited the woman with saving her life. I hadn’t spent much time with her, but my gut told me she was a good person. Sad but not necessarily unhappy. Yes, she’d called her daughter a “beech,” but I was sure most mothers and daughters referenced each other that way from time to time.
Magnet squeezed my hand, and I looked up at him. What would I have done without him through all of this?
The fire. The bomb. Mrs. Strousberg.
I’d gotten so used to internalizing so many aspects of my life, from the loss of my parents to the bullying to my job as a sexpionage agent. Yet when I’d faced each adversity in the last few days, Magnet was by my side. He didn’t push. He just let me know he was there. Last night, I wanted to confess my love for him, but it didn’t feel like the right time. I longed to make love to him too, knowing, as he’d said, when it came to him and me, everything was different. What was between us was unique and special—intimate.
When this op was over, I prayed we could go off somewhere on our own, maybe even back to St. Moritz, and get to know each other better as a man and a woman who didn’t have the threat of danger hanging over them.
I leaned against him and rested my head on his shoulder. “I’m so thankful for you.”
He kissed my forehead. “I am so thankful for you.”
The flightto Malta was planned so we’d arrive after dark. The helicopters that transported us from the main island of Malta to Gozo would land on the compound where we would stay for our time there. It was the same compound the team had used for the previous ops there.
I’d anticipated questions regarding my brief during the flight, but no one approached with any. As hard as I tried not to dwell on it, given my focus had to be on the op in front of me, I couldn’t help but wonder how many other boarding schools and universities were a breeding ground for AMPS to recruit young women—orphans in particular—to the organization, only for them to eventually learn that wherever they’d thought they might be going turned out to be hell.
I hadn’t askedabout the accommodations at the compound, but I wasn’t surprised when we arrived and Magnet said we’d be sharing a bedroom. After all, I had said I wanted to be by his side every minute I could until the op deployed.
“Do you want to talk it through?” he asked.
“Sure. If you don’t mind.”
“You go first, then I’ll run through mine.”
“I thought I’d talk to her about names for the baby she thinks I’m having. I’ll tell her it’s a girl and then share the list I will have spent my time at the table writing, just to pique her curiosity.”
“What name will be at the top?”
“I was thinking Cassie. I also plan to visit the restaurant around the same time we did before, since it was quiet.”
“And if all goes as planned, I will have to convinced Charlene to take a walk with me, so you and Francesca should be on your own.”
“According to Delfino, who’s been monitoring activity at the restaurant, no one works there other than the two women. She also said they rarely speak to each other.”
“It seems to me that they have both led sad and lonely lives.”
“Do you want to talk about your intent with Charlene?” I asked.
Magnet sighed. “Gain her trust. See if I can get her to talk about her family. Learn everything I can, then present her with the evidence that ‘she’ was in St. Moritz on several occasions when ‘crimes were committed,’ and take it from there.”
