Spies Lie Series Box Set

by D S Kane

  He knew she would be sharing her findings with whoever was running her. And, he worried, this arrangement might blow his cover. But since he was almost sure she was watching him, this was the best move he could think of, and that was the more urgent consideration.

  When she reported back, it might give him a chance to backtrace her handler. He would be free to do Mother’s bidding without worry that any transfers to fund terrorism against Israel would escape his attention. After all, that was why the Mossad had placed him in deep cover at the bank in the first place.

  The silver lining, he thought, is that surveilling Fraulein Schlein will keep my skills sharp.

  The sky was darkening red to gray as Jon donned his Burberry and fedora and walked toward the elevator.

  A brooding loneliness cast itself over him. At the age of twelve, the night his parents were murdered, the sitter had hugged him when she told him they’d died in an auto accident. A lie. Worse, when she unfurled her arms, he was all alone.

  Now, he knew the sitter’s strange accent was Israeli, but he’d no idea then. As a boy, he’d asked his mother what his father did, and now, he was sure she’d lied. His entire life was a lie.

  All those years he felt bereft. Until Lisa.

  The elevator doors opened and he entered and pressed the basement floor button.

  Last year, the night he learned of Lisa’s death, he found Yigdal Ben-Levy waiting for him outside his apartment. The spymaster told him the truth about his parents. “Mother”—Ben-Levy—was their handler. They’d been deep cover operatives for the Mossad. Assassins, kidon. Ben-Levy had told him his family name in Israel had been Sommerstein, before his parents were placed as moles within the British government.

  According to Ben-Levy, “They were heroes, slaughtered by the Syrians in retribution for Israel’s bombing of their nuclear bomb research facility. Their deaths were no accident.” And if he believed Mother, Lisa’s death had been no accident, either.

  As the elevator descended Lisa’s voice rang in his head: You promised to deliver justice to my murderer, Tariq Houmaz. He remembered touching her cheek, admiring her bright red hair, strung in a ponytail. He imagined her olive-colored eyes, staring back at him. He could hear her scream, You failed me!

  The voice of his dead fiancée hadn’t left him for months. Now it was back to haunt him again.

  As he drove the Fiat from the underground garage, the thought of Ruth’s glorious body, thin and golden, aroused him.

  “I had a very uncomfortable meeting this morning.” The mousy young woman wound the cord from the desk phone around her hand. There were tears at the corners of her eyes.

  “Tell me. All the details, please.”

  She took a deep breath to slow her heart. “He called me into his office and tried recruiting me.”

  At first there was a silence at the other end of the line, then, soft laughter. “Really? What specifically did he ask you to do?”

  “Watch the repair cue for one-offs going to or from China, Russia, or the Middle East.”

  More silence. “Good. I’ll take it from here. Do what he wants. But before providing the intel to him, send me an encrypted message with the transactions and then wait until you hear from me.”

  She took a deep breath. “Right.” The person on the other side of the line terminated the call.

  She hung up the handset, took several deep breaths and clenched her eyes shut, feeling dirty.

  The man she’d just spoken to knew things about her no one else knew. He’d threatened to have her brother, a graduate student living in London, arrested as a spy and put in prison. Even her rich uncle at the bank couldn’t know of Gunda’s connection to the man without exposing her brother to danger.

  She shook her head to clear it. Rising as if she was a robot, Gunda Schlein slinked back from the cafeteria into the Funds Transfer area.

  Tantris was crowded as soon as it opened. Jon waited at a table in the back between the exit and the restrooms, the standard position for safety. It was the same seat at the same table Ben-Levy had chosen for his meeting with Jon.

  He scanned the entrance again and again as the time approached 6 p.m.

  At the turn of the hour, the door swung open and she entered. She wore a black wool coat with a fake fur collar and flats. Nothing that would draw attention. Of course, her beauty cancelled out the disguise. He watched her eyes shift across the restaurant, searching for threats. And easily enough, she saw him.

  He thought she smiled, but it might just have been his imagination. As she walked to the table, he rose, came around, and pulled out the chair for her. She sat and waited for him to return to his seat. It was all scripted to look as if they were on a first date, and in so many ways, that’s what it was.

  Her perfume, Chanel, left him breathless, and he found himself unable to speak. She’s God now.

  She could see his confusion and giggled. “It’s nice to see that chivalry isn’t dead. It’s been a long time between sips. I missed you.”

  “How’d you manage to garner this plum job?”

  Her smile fell away. “No one told you what happened to Rafi Lev?”

  “No. Last I heard, he was still strapped in.” Jon took the menus from their waiter. He handed one to Ruth. “Try the sauerbraten. It’s very tender and quite tasty. So what happened to him?”

  “He was turned by the FSB. Can you imagine that? A Mossad station chief doubling for the Russian security service? The internal security officers at Shabak in Tel Aviv discovered his betrayal a month ago. Last I saw of him was his fat body being pushed into a van for interrogation at a safe house.” Her face scrunched and Jon noticed a deep scar along the edge of her left cheek. A new one.

  “Rafi a mole. How quaint.”

  “Yeah. But it may go deeper than that. Looks like they suspect there’s another mole, this one in the Ness Ziona’s war toys development department. An unknown. Dushov is having fits. And at least one more. One of Ben-Levy’s newest and neatest showed up at the door of Greenfield’s unnamed intelligence agency in Washington, DC.”

  Jon remembered how Ben-Levy sent Ruth Cohen to recruit him after Lisa’s death. Ruth had convinced him to go dancing with her. Then the slender blond seduced him. But at the last second, as they both stood naked, instead of fucking his brains out, she told him how Lisa died. Ruth said the reason Lisa was murdered may have been because she was trying to protect him. Their meeting had provided Jon with a way out of his grief. Ruth had been responsible for Jon’s recruitment into the Mossad as a kidon.

  After he’d returned from his failed mission, he’d run straight into her in the hallway of the Mossad’s headquarters in Herzliyya.

  Alone and lonely, Jon had moved into Ruth’s apartment while they waited for reassignment. “You gave up the apartment on the beach in Tel Aviv?”

  She nodded. “Berlin is so gray.”

  He remembered how easy it had been for him to enjoy her back then. She didn’t press him for answers to how he was coping with Lisa’s loss. He remembered the silky feel of her skin. But back then, Jon hadn’t recovered from Lisa’s death.

  He’d thought of both Lisa and Ruth as women from his past. “Berlin is a plum.”

  She touched his wrist with her fingers. Jon’s head spun toward her hand. It felt like an electric current.

  He resisted shivering. “How did you get them to make you Lev’s replacement?”

  She remained silent.

  He tried another path to get her to speak. “What a shitty way to get promoted.” Jon stopped looking at the menu and stared into her eyes. “You’ve read my file?”

  “Of course.” Her eyes shifted toward the floor. “You’re better than I thought you were. But, then again, I tasted you before you were trained. Seems you’re more like your father than Ben-Levy thought.”

  Jon wondered what was in his file, and if it could be trusted. And what was his father like? He didn’t even know.

  She scanned the menu. “I think I’ll have the co
q au vin. Stewed Rooster.” She flashed a wicked grin.

  He shook his head. “Look, I’m less than what my file says. I’m no kidon. Haven’t killed anyone yet. I’m just a katsa. And I’m working alone now.” He sighed and looked away from her face, to the menu. “Let’s order. If you want, after dinner there’s a night club in the city center specializing in blues. I know you adore that music. This club is better than the one we visited in London so many months ago, and much better than the crappy one in Tel Aviv.”

  “Maybe, maybe. But now we work together, so there’ll be no sex. So sorry.” She reached her thumb to stroke the inside of his wrist.

  He couldn’t tell what she wanted. He stared at her hand. After thinking for a few seconds, he gave up. “Why are you here? Just to touch base? We could have done that over the phone.”

  Her brows arched. “Jon, remember the hack we had Willy Wing complete?”

  He’d thought she had nothing to do with Ben-Levy’s forced assignment. But he’d been wrong.

  “So?” The waiter appeared at their table and Jon ordered for them. He also ordered a neat sixteen-year-old Lagavulin single malt Islay Scotch for each of them, remembering what Ruth had to drink the night they’d met when she’d almost bedded him.

  She waited until the waiter was far away and whispered in Hebrew. “The intel Willy supplied about the hacker was rich. I understand why Wing’s so angry and says he won’t play with us. But his hack of Sashakovich’s previous employer is a neat parting gift. She’s a former covert, very dangerous, and her former boss, Mark McDougal, fired her after her cover was blown. No one knows why he really cut her adrift. No one knows where she is now. It appears she’s gone rogue.”

  Jon leaned closer. “So? What has that got to do with me?”

  She shook her head. “You’re being dense. I need to know what else Willie knows. If he won’t play we may have to end him.”

  “No. William is my friend. He’s trustworthy. How far along is the Mossad on the decision to terminate him?” Jon’s voice sounded louder than he’d intended.

  She looked away, to the left. He knew she was about to lie. “Look it’s just a threat. We need to know everything William Wing knows. We need to know what she took from him. If he is to live—”

  The waiter came with their tumblers of straight-up Lagavulin. They waited until he’d disappeared again. Jon watched her take a deep breath. She looked straight into his eyes, her face close. “Can you find out what he knows? Get him to agree to keep our secrets? Maybe save his life?”

  He knew she was manipulating him. The threat couldn’t be real. Or could it? He grimaced as he pondered his next move. “William is my friend. Don’t even try ending him or I’ll be a bigger problem than you think he is. Clear?”

  She seemed to reel back in her seat. “Oh? Are you threatening me?”

  Jon took a deep breath to clear his head. No, this wasn’t the way to convince her. “Look, I’ll do what I can.” He examined her face as she smiled, relaxing back in her seat.

  He seethed and struggled to keep it from showing on his face. He wondered if there was a better way. It would frustrate him to do what he thought might work, but there was no other option he could think of.

  She reached out and touched his wrist again. Damn! She’s playing a seductive bitch. He thought of letting her take him to bed. Could he gain leverage against her by doing that?

  Could he use that leverage as a trade for William’s safety? He knew she wanted to maintain a business relationship with him, but her terms were both confusing and frustrating. She retracted her hand, as if she sensed what he was thinking.

  Then he remembered he did have one more issue to press. “Uh, I found some interesting transactions in the repair cue at the bank.” He reached his hand into his pocket and palmed a thumb-drive. Holding her hand, he dropped it within. “Let me know if I should follow these.” Jon reached his hand to hers and held it.

  She smiled again. It looked so sincere. But Jon knew she was trained to appear to be what she wasn’t. He tried grinning the same way and she burst out laughing.

  The bar’s crusty, sticky floor reminded Jon of the one they’d visited in London on their first date. He knew she’d be braless underneath her blouse; her breasts were small and it was how she always dressed. He’d keep his distance and try not to think about it.

  He got them each a beer and they stood in the back of the room. Ruth took the beer with one hand. Her other hand held his, as if they were a couple. She closed on him fast and snuggled against him. It was no good thinking this was a meeting of professionals if she was going to tease him. And he knew she was enjoying doing it. He finished the beer and told her he was going to get something more to drink. Something stronger. He was sure he’d need it.

  The band was a California blues group, the Lara Price Band. Jon had never heard of them, but they were excellent. Price sounded like Billie Holliday, her voice subtle, low-pitched, and nuanced.

  He handed her another beer and sipped from the glass of single malt he’d returned with. Ruth placed her arm around Jon’s waist. Her other hand forced him to surrender the Scotch to their table. She drew him onto the dance floor as Price crooned a slow love song. Ruth’s nipples scraped against his shirt through her blouse. She hugged him close on the dance floor and grinded her crotch against his. If she was trying to disorient him, she was successful. He knew it would lead nowhere, except to his bed alone.

  She drew his head to her lips with one hand. “I know what you want. And I want it too. But is it more important than the work we do? Are we not patriots?” She released him. They stood apart.

  “What do you want from me?”

  “Everything. But we can’t have that now, can we? Everything in its own good time.”

  Jon shook his head. “I get it now. You want me to do your bidding. Leave William be and I’ll do what you want. Clear?”

  She listened to the singer hit a series of spiking high notes. “She’s good. I’m glad you told me about this place.”

  Jon nodded, his teeth clenched. “Yeah. Good.”

  Had he won this round?

  The remainder of the night was a blur. Jon remembered drinking another Scotch, followed by at least two more, but maybe it was three. Or four. He’d had some difficulty walking, and Ruth had delivered him to his apartment. But after that, events dimmed.

  The alarm buzzed and his eyes flew open. His skull felt like there was an axe wedged into it, but as he drew his left hand toward his head, he felt something smooth, soft, and warm against his back. Ruth, naked beside him. He frowned. What else had happened? He got out of bed and looked for a robe. It was a work day and he’d been late yesterday.

  She rolled over and got up, facing him. The blanket fell away. “Morning.”

  His mouth opened and silence emerged. He staggered to the closet, grabbed a pair of pants and put them on to cover his nakedness.

  Her voice dropped several octaves and she feigned his British accent. “And good morning to you, Ms. Cohen.” She grinned. “Uh, Jon, in case you were wondering, we didn’t. No sex. I hadn’t had time to select a hotel, and you were in dire need of help. So I undressed you and placed you in bed. But it was late and I was dead-tired. I tried your couch but it’s too small. So I climbed in after you. You were fast asleep before I undressed. Of course, I wasn’t about to wake you.”

  He grimaced and marched into the bathroom. Now he remembered everything. Every moment of their evening was fixed in his mind. He shook his head. She might be his boss, but she’d always be a bat leveyha and treat him as her target.

  By the time he climbed out of the shower, she was gone.

  Jon dressed and headed to the garage, his cell phone in his hand. He tapped in a phone number and was dropped into voicemail. “William, it’s Jon. Call me tonight. It’s urgent.”

  Chapter Nine

  Pacific Ocean, trade route north of Hawaii

  June 25, 7:15 p.m.

  Somewhere in the middle of the Pa
cific Ocean, Cassandra Sashakovich sat under the canvas cover of one of the trawler lifeboats and waited for the sun to set. The ship she’d stowed away on glided smoothly east through rough seas. Just before boarding, she’d used one of her credit cards to leave a false trail in Hong Kong. She touched her belly. The baby bump from her rape by the man sent to assassinate her was becoming more noticeable.

  She’d strangled him. That was almost five months ago. Her breasts ached, full of milk she was sure she shouldn’t yet be producing.

  She lay prone inside the covered dinghy and twisted to the side as she retched her lunch into a plastic bag. The heat under the canvas cover was unbearable. The odor of her vomit mixed with soured breast milk and stale perspiration within her tee shirt. She puked again.

  She heard one of the crew making rounds nearby and she clenched her jaw closed against the urge to dry-heave. When she was sure the sailor was gone, she took a deep breath, thinking how Hell might be a preferable place. According to her wristwatch, she had just a few more days before they reached San Francisco, her destination. She vowed to hold on to her sanity.

  William Wing heard his cell buzzing, but wasn’t about to answer it. He lay spread-eagled, with Lily’s body grinding against his. She rode him like a jockey, slapped his face again and again as she bounced against him. He held one of her breasts in each hand, and squeezed them as she moaned. Was it show or was it real? Since he paid by the hour, did it matter?

  As he felt himself cresting, she coaxed him. “That’s right, baby. Do me harder. I’m getting close.” She pinched his nipples, tormenting him, her fingernails digging in. “Oh, oh yeah.”

  He knew she could feel him pulsing into her. She smiled and dismounted. Walking naked to the bedroom window, she looked into the harbor below. “Little Wing, why do you not have a bigger apartment? Surely, you can afford better than this.”

  He pulled on his underwear and socks. “You know I hate it when you call me that. Don’t need better. If I wanted better, I could move back to Beijing.”