Authors: Dee Henderson
“Starting that way.” She poured herself a cup of coffee and picked on a bagel. “How was the training exercise?”
“A couple minor injuries. The wind turned out to be marginal for the jump.”
A couple injuries . . . She set down the bagel. “Sam?”
“I bruised an elbow. It happens.”
She frowned as she realized Sam had covered the phone and was coughing. It didn’t sound like he had a cold. “Where are you?”
He paused before he answered. “The hospital. It’s no big deal. Wolf landed on me. We try to avoid things like that.”
She winced on his behalf. “How many ribs did you crack?”
“Maybe one of his, although he swears it isn’t so.”
A voice in the background added, “Is too.”
Sam sighed. “That’s Joe. He’s ragging us both. A weapon misfired complicating things a bit. Otherwise Wolf would have probably been a little more graceful about his crash landing. I just bruised an elbow and got the breath knocked out of me when I tried to block him.”
Sam didn’t sound badly hurt but he did sound more than a little frustrated. She leaned against the counter cradling her coffee mug. “Can I help?”
“You already have. I’m just blowing off steam.”
“You’re allowed.”
The phone got covered again as Sam barked at his partner, “Wolf, shut up and take the needle.”
Darcy covered her end of the phone to hide her laughter.
“Dar, you want to remind me why I haven’t retired yet?”
“You love it too much.”
“I’m rethinking that.”
“Tough it out, sailor.”
“Wolf is really annoying me. Call me about six your time tonight, okay? I think we’ll be heading back to Little Creek tomorrow.”
“I’ll call you,” Darcy promised.
“This day is going to pass peacefully.”
“We’ll know in twenty-four hours. I miss you, Sam.”
“Still going to be back in the States by this weekend?”
“I hope so. I seem to remember we have a date.”
“Definitely. Bring sunscreen because we’re going sailing.”
“I’m looking forward to it.” Sam loved the sea. It was time she learned to share his passion for it. “You’re too far away.”
“Tell me about it. Don’t work too hard today, Dar, and skip the worry.”
“That’s a promise. Go take care of your partner, Sam.”
JUNE 14
Friday, 9:18 a.m.
Central Intelligence Agency
Darcy picked up another letter. She was trying to wade through the mail that had piled up while she’d been overseas. The fan rotated and blew papers on her desk, forcing her to grab for her calculator to use as a paperweight. The air-conditioning for the old CIA headquarters building was out. She had her office door propped open and a fan moving air but it was still stifling hot. Most of the mail were paper versions of things she’d been able to review online or had verbally been briefed on. Classified pages went into the burn bag, and the rest went into a blue recycling tub.
“I brought you a refill.” Gabriel joined her.
She took the large iced tea her partner held out. “Thanks, Gabe. What’s with the bomb dogs roving the halls?” She wasn’t that interested in bailing out of her office for a trip to the parking lot where a sniper might be watching, but it was kind of disconcerting to find the dogs passing by. Henry and his handler had been by three times in the last forty minutes.
“Yet another phoned-in bomb threat. Don’t worry about it.”
The threats had apparently been happening with regularity while she and Gabe had been overseas. “You would think this place could trace a phone call.”
She slit open the next letter with her sharp-edged knife. The irradiation process to kill anthrax or other hazards turned the pages brittle. Mail was now a pain to deal with.
Gabe relaxed against the doorjamb. “Canada found a safe house in Ottawa they think Sergey had been using during March and April. It’s been abandoned.”
“Send Neil to take a look?”
“That’s what I was thinking.”
“The safe houses seem to have the same pattern for hiding cash boxes in the floors and tucking documents behind ductwork. How long was this house owned?”
“It was purchased over thirty years ago. You have to admire the KGB for its long-term commitment to infiltration. They were good about giving themselves places to go that would attract no attention. Money was hidden in places they might use once or twice in a decade.”
Darcy tugged open the next envelope. It was a refresher document on the meaning of the code words stamped on reports. Learning them was one of the necessary evils of working in a place that used letters to cloud even what they wanted to say. She scanned the document for new code words, feeling she should at least attempt to remember them.
GAMMA
was highly sensitive signal intelligence;
ZARF
was intelligence picked up from eavesdropping satellites;
VRK
—Very Restricted Knowledge. She flipped a couple more pages. “Do I need to know the latest ways to confuse us?”
“Just read what I give you. You’ll be fine.”
She pitched the report in the burn bag as the report of names and acronyms was itself red-striped and stamped classified.
Darcy slit open a pale blue envelope. She saw the first of the text on the page as she took it from the envelope and stopped, leaving the page half inside the envelope. “Well, well. What is this?” She pushed the box of mail aside and the recycling bin back under her desk. She elbowed aside the papers on her desk to clear a space.
“Something interesting?”
“What was Sergey’s authentication code during his embassy days?”
“K7942 and the date of the postmark.”
She turned over the envelope to check the cancellation stamp. “He sent us a note. It’s postmarked the day we found that sniper.” The delay caused by the irradiation process to keep the mail safe had just badly disrupted a priceless lead.
“Gloves.”
She was already tugging open the side drawer of her desk. She kept a box of latex gloves available, using them most often for the film work she did on the light board where fingerprints clouded images.
She pulled the piece of paper carefully from the envelope and gently laid it open. “The brittleness is going to be a problem.” The page crease cracked under the mere pressure of her fingers. “It’s his signature.”
Gabriel read over her shoulder.
We need to meet. I propose one month from today, June 24. The Fairmont Mall in Fairmont, Florida, at noon, the rare stamp and coins display of our mutual friend Thomas. I’ll bring something worth your time. I’ll be alone, bring all the security you like. I’d like five minutes face-to-face, just you and me. They had my granddaughter, Darcy. Send someone else, and I won’t show.
Darcy read the note twice. “It’s an interesting offer, Gabe.”
“I’m not sending you to meet with him again.”
She leaned back to look up at him. “That’s your emotion talking, not logic.”
“He broke his word last time; I don’t trust him. If he has something to share, he can do a dead drop and pass it to us. He wants to cut a deal, we can talk on the phone. He knows our number.”
She read the note again. She waffled on whether she trusted Sergey or not. She wanted to know what he had to say. And she wasn’t interested in leaving him out there. “He broke his word to us, so we’re not bound to keep ours. Let’s pick him up. All it will take is me as the bait.”
Twenty
* * *
JUNE 24
Monday, 9:40 a.m.
Fairmont, Florida
For days leading up to the meeting, FBI and CIA agents had been slipping into the hotel across from the Fairmont Mall. Darcy would make contact, and FBI officers would move in and arrest Sergey. In theory it was simple; in reality no one in the room expected today to go smoothly.
Darcy slipped on the watch the technician handed her. It told the time but it was basically all microphone. It was so sensitive the problem would be filtering out all the background noise from shoppers around her. It would pick up Sergey’s every word on tape.
Darcy leaned against Sam for balance as she worked to slip on the white sneakers that were tagged to track where she went. “You’ll be roving?” Sam hadn’t given her a choice about his involvement. After barking at her for the mere idea of meeting with Sergey, he said he was coming. The problem with having a relationship with a SEAL was his protective streak was about a mile wide. She’d protested for form, but it was kind of nice to have him here. She trusted the agents brought in, but they had other objectives as well as her safety on their plate. Sam would have only one, and Gabriel couldn’t attempt a foot race if it was required.
The cops couldn’t do much but give their agreement, for unless they detained Sergey the mall was a public place. The blueprints on the table showed not only the stores and the various dressing rooms, bathrooms, and elevators, but also the employees only areas and corridors behind the stores where merchandise was moved.
“I’ll be near you, and Wolf will be above us scanning the area from the food court.”
“You have to give Sergey credit; a craft fair with booths cluttering the mall hallways gives him optimum safeguards: dense public traffic and numerous ways to approach the meeting place.”
“Just stay in your assigned box, Dar, and let him come to you.”
“He’s not going to be easy to identify. You can guarantee he won’t look anything like that photo.” There were still two hours before the meeting, and ten agents were already throughout the area.
“I’ll spot him,” Sam replied. “You still owe me a day sailing.”
“When this is over I’m taking a week off.”
She slipped on glasses and looked at the monitor. “How are visuals, Gabe?” There was a thin wire camera in the frames of the glasses. Her partner was already in the command post van in the mall parking lot, tracking cameras that monitored every inch of the meeting area. She had audio with him through a small earpiece and a miniature microphone in her flag lapel pin.
“Tiny. I get about fifteen degrees directly where you are looking, but it’s the best that lens can do.”
“I’ll look around a lot,” she promised. Sam handed her the shopping bag she would be carrying. It contained her special gift from the Chief of Disguise to be used if needed. “Gabriel, I’m coming to join you at the van. Shut off the video for a minute.”
“Why?”
“I plan to kiss Sam good-bye.”
Her partner chuckled and she heard a click.
“It’s been kind of crowded around here lately,” Darcy said, smiling at Sam.
“It has indeed.” Sam rested his hands on her shoulders. “You enjoy this fieldwork.”
“More than I do sitting behind a desk.”
“You’ll play today by the book?” Sam asked.
“I’ll get the job done.”
“I note the change. I’ll be close by. If anything goes wrong, you look for me.”
Darcy rested her hands against his. “That’s a promise.” Sam and Tom would both have audio, hearing everything that was going on.
“Come here, gorgeous.” Sam drew her to him and claimed her lips in a quick kiss. “You probably won’t see me very often, but you’ll never be out of my sight.”
She squeezed his hands and stepped back. “Gabriel, I’m on the way.”
It was time to go to work.
* * *
The rare stamp and coin booth was set up in corridor E of the mall. On the left side of it was a booth selling customized painted mailboxes, on the right a booth selling sculptured candles. The stores in corridor E included two small clothes boutiques, a Hallmark card shop, a candy store, a music store, and was anchored by a department store.
Darcy entered the area ten minutes before the prearranged meeting time, carrying with her the shopping bag with her gift from the Chief of Disguise and three packages bought from stores as she walked through the mall. A backup microphone was built into the handle of the shopping bag. The packages purchased during her walk through the mall let her control space around by simply where she set them down.
The rare stamp and coin display was owned and managed by Thomas Youst, a mutual friend of both agencies. He was a Canadian, used by both sides over the years as a trusted courier for documents. His business gave him a reason to travel wherever he was needed. The CIA hadn’t told Thomas they were coming, and she doubted Sergey had either. But if for some reason Sergey was not going to show, Darcy figured Thomas would be holding the message.
She stopped at the east table of the three tables that made up his booth and looked at one of the stamp books. Twenty bucks for a stamp, all the way to several stamps priced in the hundreds. If she’d been a collector, Thomas’s booth would be a fascinating stop.
“Have a favorite era?”
“I collect by topic. I love butterflies,” she mentioned, “and dogs.”
Thomas didn’t even blink at the message, he just reached for the other photo album and turned it back four pages. “Have you seen Scotty, President Truman’s dog?”
Maybe she would start a collection. The stamp was gorgeous.
She set down her packages. “May I?”
“Sure.”
She tagged the sheet with one of the Post-it notes provided and turned pages in the display book, looking at what else he had.
Thomas stepped over to the cash register to serve a customer buying a silver eagle.
Now these were pretty. She studied a set of four puppies that were on a Danish stamp.
“It’s overpriced.” Gabe’s warning came softly in her ear.
She smiled but didn’t answer him. She turned back to the Scotty. Christmas was five months and a day away. And they wanted Thomas to stay in business. She reached for her purse. Her company credit card came out. “Would you wrap these two please?” she asked Thomas, selecting both the terrier and the puppies.
“Darcy. Quit shopping. You’re on the job.”
She brushed back her hair and smiled again, knowing a camera was perched in the decorative ferns beside the staircase that had her face in view.
She had picked out four of the agents in the area, but Sam still escaped her. Most of the agents would be shopping within the stores in the area, awaiting word to move on Sergey. She didn’t bother to look at her watch. Sergey would not be late this time, knowing she’d leave rather than linger.