The Dark Hour

by Robin Burcell

  “And here I am,” Griffin replied, quickly glancing over, seeing that Becca was still alone.

  “Tell them about the party at the pharmaceutical convention in Prague last year. The one where that idiot spilled the bottle of champagne down the front of the countess’s dress.”

  Never mind that Griffin hadn’t been to Prague in years, he had a bigger purpose in mind. “My wife tells it much better than I,” Griffin said. “Let me get her.”

  “Oh, yes, yes,” Johnson said. “Wait till you hear this. Hilarious!”

  Griffin made a beeline toward Becca. Still alone. “You look like you could use a drink,” he told her.

  She turned toward him. “No, th—” Her voice caught, and she cleared her throat, taking the glass from him. “Apparently I do.”

  Although she was a highly trained CIA spy who’d been taught to curb any outward signs of emotion, deep down, Griffin had hoped to see a spark of something more.

  And that bothered him. That he still cared.

  She gave a bland smile, glancing over his shoulder, saying, “My fiancé probably would not appreciate me taking drinks from strangers, however. I hope he is not too angry.”

  Fiancé? Griffin turned, saw the man who’d been by her side, approaching from the elevator bank, and he glanced in Sydney’s direction. Sydney shrugged, mouthing, Sorry. Griffin turned back to Becca, suppressing the urge to say, I wasn’t aware you were divorced, instead saying, “Congratulations,” just as the man in question walked up. He stood as tall as Griffin, his dark, wavy hair slicked back and worn slightly long, brushing the collar of his impeccable tux.

  “Darling,” Becca said, placing her hand on his arm.

  “You look a little pale.”

  “I feel a migraine coming on. I was just going to take a pill.”

  The man looked at Griffin, his gaze narrowing slightly. “And who is your friend?”

  “I’m not sure,” Becca said, turning a questioning look to Griffin. “We’ve only just met.”

  Griffin held out his hand. “Raymond Zachary.”

  “Bertrand Leighton,” he said, shaking hands, and Griffin recognized the name immediately. He was one of the CEOs of Hilliard and Sons Laboratories. In other words he worked with Luc Montel. “Forgive me, Mr. Zachary, but you seem vaguely familiar.”

  Griffin thought the same, but had hoped he was wrong. “Pharmaceutical convention last year in Prague?”

  “One of the better conventions,” he said, smiling, then looked at his watch, a Girard-Perregaux Tourbillon, something that cost more than Griffin made in a year on his government salary. “You’ll excuse us, Mr. Zachary,” Bertrand said.

  “Of course,” Griffin replied.

  Becca placed her hand on Bertrand’s arm. “I’ll join you in a minute, darling. I need to freshen my makeup and go take that pill.” She smiled at Griffin. “A pleasure to meet you. Enjoy the party.” She started in the direction of the ladies’ room.

  Griffin nodded, then walked to a corner of the room where he wouldn’t be observed as he took out his cell phone. There was a text message from Giustino: “Found it. Might take a while.”

  Giustino was probably one of the best safecrackers in the business, but he was working under a handicap, without the proper tools. Griffin checked the time on the phone. The message was only about two minutes old, and Luc wasn’t due back for another half hour. Still time, and Griffin relaxed—until he realized that Sydney wasn’t where he left her. He immediately scanned the room, looking for threats he might have missed, then saw her standing just a few feet away, speaking to the Johnsons. He was about to start in that direction when a waiter approached. “For you,” he said, handing Griffin a note.

  He opened it, reading: “Gallery in 10. B.”

  Assuming he was reading this correctly, Becca was ready to meet.

  Chapter 68

  December 12

  Washington, D.C.

  Each of the guests had been ushered through the metal detectors, then through the various security checkpoints before being allowed into the ballroom, and Marc stood just inside the perimeter, adjusting his earpiece, waiting for word that Lisette and Olivia Grogan had arrived. He saw them enter at the same time he heard Ennis radioing that they were in.

  Lisette smiled as Olivia introduced her to a congressman. She shook hands with the man, then followed Olivia past a long table draped in white damask, bearing an elegant ice carving of a swan about to take flight.

  A waiter seemed to appear out of nowhere, offering them champagne. It was Ennis. He and the other ATLAS agents also posing as waiters worked the room and would take turns offering Lisette champagne or hovering near her. The real waiters, who had originally been hired to serve the champagne, were suddenly left without a job, and so a quick decision was made to have them walk around serving hors d’oeuvres from their trays—which left the hors d’oeuvres table with its massive swan ice sculpture in the center woefully empty. Marc doubted anyone noticed, or even cared, and he returned his attention back to Lisette. Even though she was wired, the devices failed far too often, hence the backup signal. If anyone saw her with a glass, it was their notice.

  Ennis held out the tray. Olivia took a glass, Lisette did not, and when Ennis turned, walked away, Marc relaxed, even though he wasn’t expecting anything to happen.

  About twenty minutes later, Ennis joined Marc on the other side of the empty hors d’oeuvres table, just behind the sculpture. They stood there, looking around at the nearly two hundred guests who had arrived, and Ennis said, “Apparently Olivia Grogan isn’t too happy about our interference. She was bitching that the hors d’oeuvres should be on the table, since that’s what she paid for.”

  “She’ll get over it,” Marc replied.

  They stood there a few moments more, when Ennis said, “I thought this was a simple sit-down tea for seventy-five. Never mind there’s no tea. Who are all these people?”

  “Damned good question.” Marc eyed the guests, everyone from congressmen and senators to heads of major corporations and the handful of socialites and movie stars. “Maybe Olivia got greedy and wanted to make a bigger splash for her announcement to run for office. Looks like the who’s who on the political donor list,” he said, then paused at the babel of various languages he heard, even catching a few unusual dialects he hadn’t expected . . . And that was when he started listening to the conversations. “I don’t like this,” Marc said, identifying some of the languages. “Some of these guests are from the wobbler countries.”

  “Wobbler countries?”

  “Tex’s term. The countries that’ll switch sides or start a war with the least provocation. If anything happens to the people in this room, it’d be an international political disaster.”

  “As in, if this crackpot takes a shot at Olivia, make sure the bullet doesn’t pass through her and hit one of them?”

  “That’d be a good start.”

  They stood there a few minutes more, and, not seeing anything suspicious, separated.

  Marc wasn’t sure how much time passed. Ten, maybe fifteen minutes. It wasn’t the time that concerned him, it was the quiet. He looked for Lisette, finding her and Olivia talking with a group of politicians who seemed to be consoling Olivia on the loss of her husband.

  Seemed, because he couldn’t hear a word.

  “Damn it.” He keyed the radio. “Is it just me or are we not picking up Lisette’s mic?”

  He heard nothing but static. No one answered.

  Was it his radio or were all the radios out?

  He searched the floor for Ennis, saw him near the doors leading to the service entrance, talking with another agent. As Marc crossed the room toward him, his cell phone rang. It was Tex. At the same moment, Olivia Grogan and Lisette disappeared down a short hallway to the ladies’ room. “Not a good time,” he told Tex. “The radios are out and I’ve los
t visual on Lisette.”

  “Well, you might want to find her and fast,” Tex said. “Because I’ve got some bad news.”

  Marc held the phone closer to his ear as he listened to what Tex was saying. “You’re sure about this information?” he asked Tex.

  “As sure as the evidence in front of me. No one else could’ve made that call. Olivia Grogan is part of LockeStarr.”

  “I’ll get back to you,” Marc said, worried that Lisette and Olivia Grogan still hadn’t emerged from the hallway.

  Ennis walked up, holding his tray aloft as though offering Marc a drink. “You weren’t transmitting.”

  “Is anyone?” Marc asked.

  “It depends on where you’re standing. The channel we’re using for Lisette’s audio seems to be affected by some sort of interference.”

  “Hell.”

  “It’s an easy fix. We all switch to channel three.”

  “Except that we need to get word to Lisette, now. Where the hell is she?”

  “Why? What’s wrong?”

  Marc pulled out his radio, changed the channel, saying, “Olivia’s part of LockeStarr. Tex just called and said Carillo connected her to a number definitely associated with the Network.” As Ennis changed his radio over, then gave a hand signal to Stevens to switch channels, Marc looked up to see if Lisette and Olivia Grogan had returned. “Where does that hallway lead to?” he asked Ennis.

  “It circles back around. Only thing down there are the restrooms, a couple pay phones, and a courtyard surrounded by an eight-foot wall for the smokers in the group.”

  They watched. Finally the two women emerged. Lisette’s face was calm, implacable. And just as Marc started to relax, thinking all was well, she walked up to a waiter, grabbed a champagne glass, then took a sip.

  “Find out what’s wrong,” Marc said.

  Ennis took his tray, crossed the room toward Lisette. Marc radioed the other agents that Lisette had no audio, and had just picked up a champagne glass. When Stevens looked over, Marc angled his head toward Lisette, as he radioed, “Do not lose visual. Ennis’s making contact with her now.”

  Marc watched while Ennis backed into Lisette, knocking her glass of champagne, then turned to apologize as he offered her a napkin and a new glass. The two spoke briefly, but Marc’s relief was short-lived when he lost sight of Olivia Grogan. He surveyed the room, seeing the top of Olivia’s head on the other side of the ice sculpture. She was simply standing there next to the table.

  Ennis met Marc halfway, saying, “Olivia told Lisette she needed to sit for a few minutes. It’s when she got up that Lisette noticed she was sweating profusely and her hands were shaking. Extremely edgy.”

  “Maybe the woman’s nervous about announcing her campaign,” Marc replied, just as a small contingent of Secret Service agents arrived, surrounding Vice President Harrison. “What the hell is he doing here?”

  “Damned if I know. He wasn’t even on the guest list. It must have been a last-minute addition.”

  Marc’s gaze flew to Olivia Grogan, who was staring toward the door where the vice president stood, greeting those nearest the entrance. Okay, think. She was about to announce that she was going to run for her late husband’s seat. That was enough to make anyone nervous, surely, so maybe it was nothing.

  But then, most people running for the Senate weren’t part of a worldwide criminal organization.

  And then Ennis said, “What’s that in Olivia’s hand?”

  He looked over, saw she was holding what appeared to be a small vial, and he prayed like hell it was only perfume.

  Chapter 69

  December 12

  Château d’Montel Winery

  Outside Paris

  The party at the château had thinned considerably, with only a handful of guests loitering about, by the time Griffin ascended the stairs to the gallery. And with each step he took, he wondered if he’d made a big mistake. Too many emotions roiling through him. A dangerous mix on a mission like this.

  The gallery itself overlooked the spacious foyer, where a few guests stood, talking among themselves as they waited for their coats from the footmen. The wall behind Griffin was filled with oil paintings of pastoral landscapes and men and women with powdered hair and satin finery from a bygone era. Three benches were placed evenly around the half-circle space, all empty, and Griffin walked around the balcony, wondering if Becca was going to show.

  She was already there, standing in a shadowed corner near a suit of armor that stood sentinel over a darkened hallway. At first, she said nothing, her expression one of diligence, caution. But then it softened momentarily as she asked, “How are you?”

  And once again he wasn’t prepared for the flood of emotions on seeing her, especially the anger over her subterfuge. “Well, let’s see. I painted the kitchen after the funeral. Yellow just wasn’t cutting it for me.”

  “I’m being serious, Zachary.”

  “Yeah? Well, so am I. It’s been two goddamned years. And I thought you were dead,” he whispered. “How do you think I am?”

  She ignored his outburst, “You look tired.”

  Griffin studied her face, trying to assess what she was about. “Let’s just say the last few days have taken their toll. So what game are you playing?”

  “Game?” she asked.

  “The hit man who killed Faas came after us last night. Anything to do with you?”

  “Oh my God. If I hadn’t sent that package to Faas . . .”

  There were a million questions he wanted to ask her about the last two years, but this wasn’t the time or place. He needed to get to the bottom of this. “Why Faas?”

  “I couldn’t think of anyone else, and sending it to the museum seemed so simple. I thought if I mailed it from the lab, it would be lost in the volume of packages.” Becca crossed her arms, as though suddenly cold. “The plan might have succeeded, except someone hacked into their system a couple months before, so they were on the alert, and caught the unauthorized shipment—thankfully only after it had been mailed.”

  “Luc didn’t suspect you?”

  “No. I heard he suspected one of his special guards, who it turned out was skimming drugs and selling them on the side. Apparently there had been other unauthorized shipments that same day. The guard denied it. His body was found the next morning.”

  Everything Becca said had the ring of authenticity. But Griffin knew from experience that it was far easier to maintain a lie if the majority of it was framed with the truth. “Is that why you were in Amsterdam?”

  “How did you know?”

  “We had a witness.”

  “I had hoped to warn you. Once Luc tracked the package to the museum, he sent Bertrand to retrieve it, and someone to kill Faas.”

  “Bertrand? Your fiancé?”

  She clamped her mouth shut, as though biting back a retort, her eyes sparking. “Yes. And I asked to accompany him to do some shopping. I thought if I could catch you before you met up with Faas, warn you somehow . . .”

  He’d only seen the man from across the street and in the dark, thank God, or Bertrand might have recognized him. “Wouldn’t it have been easier to notify your handler? What was his name?”

  “Reggie.”

  “Or pick up a phone and call Langley? You surely know the number to CIA headquarters?”

  “I did the best I could!” she whispered harshly, then stopped, took a deep breath to calm herself. “Look. After the lab’s computer was hacked, everyone who worked there was under the microscope. I risked my life to get that package out. And the moment I found out that Luc sent Bertrand to retrieve the package himself from Amsterdam, I immediately arranged for a face-to-face with my handler, so that you could be stopped.”

  “You’re sure this information made it to Thorndike?”

  “Positive. I heard Reggie call him. That’
s how I found out that you’d already left. Thorndike promised they’d do everything in their power to stop you, because they knew you’d be walking into a trap. If you were caught, it would compromise the entire operation.”

  So now he knew why Thorndike burned him.

  Someone pushed open the front door in the foyer below. Cold air and the scent of fresh fallen snow drifted up toward them. Griffin glanced down, saw several people standing in the foyer, before turning his attention back to Becca, trying to decide what direction to take. “Are you aware Reggie is dead? Murdered in his apartment.”

  Becca closed her eyes and it was several moments before she opened them again, her face turning pale. “He was supposed to meet me here tonight. This was to be our last mission.”

  “You saw the American newspapers, no doubt. Are you a double agent?”

  She turned her gaze toward Griffin, her eyes glistening. “There was a time when you never would have asked . . .”

  “That was a long time ago. Two years in fact.”

  “Well, forgive me, but it took longer than I thought to gain Luc’s trust.”

  “And what’s so important that you sold your soul for two years?”

  “This.” She opened her hand, revealing a flash drive. “What I was supposed to be passing off to my handler tonight. Not only is Dr. Fedorov’s research on here, but so is the list of every seaport in the Western Hemisphere that LockeStarr has compromised, as well as the security flaws they intend to exploit. And where they’re going to release the virus if they recover that missing vial. Luc has never allowed this information on any computer that connects to the Internet. And he intends on selling it. Tonight.”

  If what she said was true—and he wanted to believe her—then what she held in her hand was the key they needed to bring down LockeStarr, what they’d come looking for. But then her words about the missing vial sank in, and he recalled what McNiel had said about her stealing the virus from the lab. “Who are you planning on selling it to, Becca?”