Rockman and the other runners could speak directly to agents such as Lia through a secure satellite communications system. An ear-set chip was embedded in Lia’s inner ear; the chip was just small enough to escape detection by a metal detector. But the most critical part of the system was contained in her jacket, whose studs and zippers were actually an antenna and the miniaturized radio gear. Unfortunately, the communications system itself was not perfect; the need to not only keep transmissions secure but also limit them so they couldn’t be used to direct others to an agent meant that there were generally only small geographic and time windows when it could be used. The direct-link satellite had to be almost directly overhead; this wasn’t always possible. The field agents often fell back on small, secure satellite phones and a wireless transmitter built into handheld computers they used for a variety of tasks.
Rubens had two teams working on upgrading the implant com system; it was just a matter of time, they predicted, before they could implant his thoughts in his agents’ heads on the go.
He believed they were joking, though that wasn’t necessarily a given.
Besides Rockman and Telach, there were three other men on duty. All top-shelf geeks chosen from other NSA areas, they handled and coordinated the various intercepts funneling in from the NSA’s vast outer reaches. The team was still small because the mission was just getting under way; by the time Lia got Dean into Russia at least a dozen people would be on duty. Literally hundreds more, toiling at their various jobs in the Puzzle Palace and associated military agencies, could be called on to lend expertise and backup in an emergency.
Rubens took a quick tour around the room, then told Telach to page him if he was needed. He gave Rockman and the others a wave, then entered the decompression chamber.
The chamber had nothing to do with atmospheric pressure, though the process of clearing its scans seemed to take nearly as long. The original designers had wanted to make the Art Room a full-blown “clean room,” meaning that anyone entering would have to wear a special suit inside, doffing it on leaving. Rubens had personally nixed the idea, but as he stood waiting for the various sensors to do their work, he wondered if the showers and bio suits wouldn’t have been more expedient. Finally satisfied that he harbored nothing he hadn’t come in with — and it did remember what he came in with — the automated security computer cleared Rubens into the vestibule, where he was met by two men in black from the Security Division, who’d picked this moment at random to do a PASS check. He submitted; there was no choice, not even for the director himself. He was directed to sit on a metal folding chair while one of the men took what looked like a small Palm Pilot from his pocket, along with a set of wires. The handheld computers were made by a company formed solely to work on NSA gear; a wide variety were used for an array of functions by NSA employees and field agents. In this case, the small computer was optimized as a lie detector, running a miniature version of the updated PASS, or the Polygraph Assisted Scoring System, that was the primary lie detector software used at the agency. The wires were taped to his palm and temples. Rubens was next asked a dozen questions drawn at random from the computer’s list. Most, though not all, had to do with security matters, but there were others thrown in to keep subjects off their guard, such as: “Have your sexual preferences changed in the last two weeks?”
They hadn’t. The two men showed no emotion whatsoever; Rubens could have told them that he was a pedophile and they would not have cared, as long as the machine said he wasn’t lying.
Cleared, he headed back upstairs to the eighth floor of OPS 2/A, where he had his office next to the director’s. He was running late — his cousin had invited him to her seven-year- old daughter’s First Holy Communion party, and while he ordinarily avoided such events, he had accepted this invitation partly because the guest list included Johnson Greene, a congressman on the Defense Appropriations Committee. The congressman was expected to run for Senate; if he won, he would be a likely candidate for the Intelligence Committee within two years. It was never too early to cultivate someone with that kind of potential — especially since he had been a critic of the agency in the past.
A mild and uninformed critic, the best kind.
After checking his messages and making sure his computers and office were secure, Rubens ran the security gamut and left Black Chamber. Traveling without a driver or bodyguard, he took his agency Malibu out of Crypto City, through Annapolis Junction. After a brief jaunt on the Baltimore— Washington Parkway, he turned to the west and headed toward a rather inconspicuous suburban enclave of yellow and white raised ranches. Rubens took a right turn past a stone fence where the words “Sleepy Hills” had been enshrined in floodlit mock stone; a short distance down the road he took another right and then a left, entering a cul-de-sac. He pulled into the third driveway on the right, where a sensor in the garage read his license plate and automatically opened the second bay door.
Rubens was out of the car as the garage door came down, sidling across the narrow space at the front to a vehicle more in keeping with his personal preferences — his own black BMW M-5. The garage and car, and in fact the entire house and block, were under constant surveillance, but this did not keep Rubens from making his own discreet check, taking a small container of powder from his pocket and sprinkling a generous portion over the locks and handle, as well as part of the hood and the door for the gas cap. The powder contained a chemical that interacted with oil residues less than twenty-four hours old. When he was sure that no one had touched his car he used his key to unlock it, got in, gave the interior another check, then left the garage.
His next stop was a car wash. The fingerprint powder supposedly didn’t harm the car paint, but Rubens didn’t trust the guarantees. Besides, he didn’t particularly care for anything associated with him to be dirty, not in the least.
No one else at the NSA went to the length of keeping a safe house as a car drop. It was almost certainly unnecessary, and the bureaucracy’s attitude toward the arrangement could be seen in the fact that Rubens paid for the safe house himself.
That was shortsighted of them, in his opinion. There was no such thing as too much security, especially when you were head of Desk Three. But then he took other precautions that the bureaucracy undoubtedly scoffed at, including not one but two cyanide capsules implanted under his skin, which he was fully prepared to break if the circumstances required.
As for paying for the house himself, Rubens considered it almost an investment, given the continual rise in real estate prices over the past few years. Besides, he lived independently of his government salary — and in fact regarded it as something less than a gratuity. It did not quite cover the amount of money he spent each year on clothes.
Car washed and dried, he got back on the highway and headed south toward Washington and his cousin’s home. When Rubens arrived, the party was just about reaching its height. A band that looked vaguely like ’N Sync and sounded like a cross between country pop and thrash metal, with the occasional rap beat thrown in, held forth on a stage in front of the pool.
The swimming pool and surroundings had been shaped to look like a bamboo sanctuary. The bamboo was rather obviously plastic; Rubens, whose own pool looked like the contemplative pond of a Zen monastery, smiled wryly at his cousin’s poor taste as she thanked him for coming.
Greta Meandes was related to him on his mother’s side. Greta had money, of course. No one related to Rubens did not have money; it was part of their genetic structure. But the bulk of it came from her husband, who worked as a CEO. As if that weren’t bad enough, his company made paper products, one of which was — naturally — toilet paper. It seemed to Rubens a grotesque satire on the decline of the family’s American branch, and he tended to keep Greta at arm’s length, even though she held a relatively important job as counsel to the House Defense Appropriations Committee.
“Sylvia looks very sweet,” said Rubens, who in fact had not seen the girl yet.
“She’ll be
so glad that her favorite uncle could make it,” said Greta, as phony as ever.
“Yes,” said Rubens. The girl was actually his cousin once removed, but it was typical of Greta to be imprecise.
“I was talking to your mum just the other day,” said Greta. “She called with regrets.”
“Switzerland can be difficult to leave this time of year,” said Rubens.
“That’s exactly what she said.”
Rubens nodded politely as Greta began telling him how perfectly tuned the communion ceremony had been — balloons for the children, a sermon that included references to Chuckles the Clown.
A server approached with champagne. Five-five, she had a bright, beautiful face. Her curly shoulder-length hair was held back by a ribbon, accentuating her lightly freckled cheeks. These, in turn, complemented her very round breasts, which swelled from the black cocktail outfit like the glorious chest of Venus offered to the youth Adonis in the obscure but exquisite Estasi by Giorgione, one of Titian’s teachers. The painting hung in Rubens’ bedroom, a constant source of inspiration.
Some might translate the Italian title of the work as “Ecstasy,” others as “Ravishment” or “Rape.” All three ideas occurred to Rubens as he took a drink from the tray.
“Congressman Greene is here,” said Greta, probably hoping to break his stare as the girl walked away.
“How very nice,” murmured Rubens.
“He’s over by the pool, getting ready to take a dip. You should talk to him later — he’s running for senator.”
“He is?” said Rubens, feigning not to know much about him. “Greene is from Kentucky, right?”
“He’s on the Defense Appropriations Committee,” said Greta. “You didn’t know?”
“I can’t keep track. Honestly.”
Greta nodded. She knew that her cousin worked for the NSA, though they never discussed it. He doubted she knew what he did. More than likely she thought him a career paper-pusher, an image Rubens did his best to reinforce. He even doubted she knew Desk Three existed, though it was possible she had caught references to the supporting infrastructure through her work.
“Maybe I’ll say hello to the congressman,” said Rubens. “After I mingle.”
“Good.” Greta gave him a peck on the cheek and slipped away, leaving him with a perfect view of the waitress, who was now serving drinks to a cluster of leering white-haired business associates of Greta’s husband. Rubens sidled into a position to watch her pass back to the bar, feigning interest in the band. He tilted his glass up in her direction as she went by as a signal that he wanted more. She nodded; it seemed a professional nod, however, and after smiling in response he turned to look at the stage, determined to be discreet in his ogling.
Which meant he had a perfect view a moment later when the lead guitarist did a full-gainer off the stage into the nearby pool, guitar and all.
Unfortunately, the guitar was still plugged into its amp and power source. Even more unfortunately, Congressman Greene had just gone in the pool himself. The enormously loud pop and the massive blue spark that enveloped the stage appeared to some in the audience as just another part of the band’s act, but the odor of ozone and fried gristle that followed permitted no such delusion.
6
The first flight on the board at Gate Two proved to be a flight to Rzeszow, a city in southeastern Poland. Dean dutifully bought his ticket, though he had begun to have his doubts about both the woman from the rest room and the mission itself. Hadash had said it would be easy; Dean had doubted that, but he had at least thought it would be straightforward. So far it had been anything but.
Looking at the plane did nothing to assure him. The aircraft could be charitably described as a torpedo-shaped screen door with propellers attached. In fairness, the Ilyushin IL-14 had been a serviceable transport in its day; unfortunately, its day had come and gone fifty years before.
As Dean strapped himself into the thinly padded seat, two Polish nuns took the row in front of him. Undoubtedly their presence was beneficial, because the plane made it to Rze-szow in one piece.
Dean followed the others out the cabin door, down the stairway to the tarmac, lit in the darkness by a pair of distant lights. The passengers had to retrieve their own bags; Dean hesitated for a moment before grabbing the blue-and-brown suitcase he had been given back in the States. He snapped out the handle and began pulling the suitcase behind him toward the nearby terminal building. He had taken only a few steps when a Polish customs agent materialized from the shadows, demanding in good but brusque English that he follow him back to his office. Dean’s muscles tensed and his eyes narrowed into wary slits as he studied the shadows for the most likely ambush spots. But rather than shanghaiing him in the customs office, the Polish officer led Dean through a narrow corridor at the side of the terminal to an outside door. He grinned and held it open.
A wave of paranoia flushed through Dean, but there was nothing to do but go through the door. For a moment he feared that the man’s coffee-stained teeth would be his last memory of the world.
They weren’t. A car waited a short distance away. In the driver’s seat was the woman he had seen in Heathrow.
“In,” she said.
“You want to pop the trunk so I can put my suitcase in?”
“Leave it,” she said. “It’s junk. Same with the carry-on. Clothes probably don’t fit anyway.”
Dean hauled the suitcase around to the other side of the car anyway. He might have thrown the bags in the back, except that the woman pressed the accelerator as he opened the door. He barely got inside in one piece.
“Did I do something to you, or have you been a bitch all your life?” asked Dean.
“Listen, Chuck, there’s one thing we have to get straight,” she started.
She didn’t finish, because Dean had his hands around her throat.
“Enough is enough,” he told her, nudging his right hand against her neck. His fingers held a small, very sharp blade made of a carbon-resin fiber he’d smuggled aboard the plane in the back of his belt. The material was only 90 percent as strong as the steel used in the best class of assault knives, but 90 percent was more than enough to slit a throat, even a pretty one.
“Your call,” said the woman, whose foot remained on the gas.
“Pull off the road gradually,” said Dean.
“I don’t think so. We’re being followed.”
Dean pushed the knife blade ever so gently against her neck, tickling her common carotid artery. It wasn’t the best placement, but it was adequate.
“Have it your way, Chucky boy.”
“Hit the brakes and you’ll bleed to death in thirty seconds,” he warned.
“Don’t be so dramatic.” She eased off her speed and pulled to the right, driving past a row of trucks. “It would take two minutes for me to die, if not three or four.”
A blue light began flashing behind them.
“See what I was saying?” said the woman.
Dean nudged her throat one last time as a warning, then slid his hand down to the back of the seat rest as she stopped the car. A pair of policemen approached with flashlights. Dean noticed that she not only kept the car running but also had her foot hovering over the gas pedal.
He also noticed that she had changed her miniskirt for a pair of multipocketed cargo pants, which seemed a bit of a shame.
The woman waited until the policeman was at the side of the car before rolling down the window. When she did, the policeman said something in Polish; the woman answered with a laugh and the policeman laughed, too. Then the man became very serious, apparently asking for her papers. She dug into her jacket for them. It occurred to Dean that the policeman’s angle gave him a pretty fair peek at her breasts, a view that she did nothing to discourage. Finally she handed over a thickly folded set of papers. The policeman frowned some more, took something from the middle, then gave them back. He and his comrade retreated to their car. When they were inside, she started forward slowly.
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“What did you say?” Dean asked.
“That we’re American spies and would kick his butt if he interfered with us.”
“Seriously.”
“I am serious.”
“What did you really say?”
“He is nosy, isn’t he?”
“Who are you talking to?” said Dean.
“Voices. I hear voices. I’m Joan of Arc. Didn’t they tell you that, Chuck?”
Dean grabbed her neck again. “Never, ever call me Chuck, Chucky, or Chuck-bob.”
“Chuck-bob?” She started laughing uncontrollably, and didn’t even stop when he pressed the knife harder against her flesh. “Chuck-bob?”
“Explain what’s going on.”
“Hang on. I have another bribe to pay.” She pulled over to the side of the road, which had narrowed somewhat since they left the warehouse area of the airport. It looked deserted, but it wasn’t — a pair of headlights appeared on the opposite shoulder. They belonged to a Toyota pickup, which revved across the pavement. The driver pulled close enough to their car that Dean could smell his breath when he rolled down the window. Joan of Arc handed him an envelope and the truck flew away. She put the car in gear immediately, continuing down the long, dark expanse. After about a minute and a half, she took a turn onto what seemed to be a dirt road; fifty yards of potholes later they whipped onto a highway, just in front of a panel truck.
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