Ochee chornya. Dark eyes. Like hers.
“Can you confirm the identity of this man?” Horst asked.
“That’s Alexei Klesko, my father.”
“Have you had any contact with this man in the past two weeks?”
Contact with Klesko? Not possible. The man had survived the gunshot wounds he’d sustained on Shelter Island, four months earlier, but the word was that because he had intimate knowledge of the black-market weapons trade in Eastern Europe and other regions, he had been kept in federal custody and moved to a secret detention facility overseas for “questioning.” They called it “Extraordinary Rendition,” and it was generally considered to be a dark abyss from which few prisoners ever returned.
“You’re looking for him in the wrong place,” Wally said, trying not to betray the sense of uneasiness she was beginning to feel. “Your spook buddies have him in a hole somewhere.”
“Yeah, well . . . ” Horst hesitated. “Two weeks ago, Klesko was taken out of custody and brought into the field. He was to be our bona fides for a deal in the Sudan, the details of which I can’t share.”
Shit. Wally knew Klesko and had no doubt where this story was headed.
“In the course of the operation,” Horst went on, looking more than a little embarrassed, “Klesko escaped from our custody.”
Of course he did. Wally’s blood began to race.
“The most positive thing we have going for us is good intel about where he’s headed,” Horst continued. “We’ll be ready—and in full force—when he pokes his head up.”
“And that destination would be?”
“Here. At this point, we’re not entirely sure why—”
“What do you mean, here?”
Horst paused and looked Wally straight in the eye.
“I mean here, Wallis. Klesko is coming for you.”
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
My most sincere thanks to Ben Schrank, Anne Heltzel, Caroline Donofrio, Jessica Shoffel, and all the folks at Razorbill/Penguin. Kari Stuart, Robert Lazar, and the ICM team have been in my corner all along, for which I will always be grateful. My sources of personal support—spiritual, psychological and otherwise—are legion, including Peter Maduro, Hailyn Chen, Leslie Rainer, Arlen Heginbotham, Sandy Kroopf, Lisa Bromwell, Jon and Margot Healey, David Sanger, Elizabeth McQueen, Kevin and Dagmar Gorman, Dave and Tracy Story, Kate Story, Fiona Story, Naomi Miller-Altuner, Kezia Miller, Bill Martin, Peyton Reed, Mark and Katie Cowen, Rick Hays, Chris Meyer, Susannah Grant, Roxanna Badin, Jodie Burke, Vera Blasi, Geoffrey Sturr, Marischa Slusarski, Ricardo Mestres, Brian Tudor, Andy Day, Lisa Rosen, Diana Mason, Nan Donlin, Nina Frank, Steven Rapkin, and, of course, the Shaw Girls.
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