“What’s ROE?” Dowling asked, referring to the rules of engagement that would govern their use of deadly force during the mission.

“There are none,” said Polk. “But remember, we need Cloud alive. Try not to harm anyone else, but if you have to, your weapons and ammo are Russian and they’re sanitized.”

“How many are we expecting?”

“We don’t know.”

“What if he’s not there, sir?”

“Go to your standard protocols. Everything you need—cash, ID, visa, et cetera—is at Moscow Central Station. Split up and move out of the country.”

“Roger that, sir.”

“By the way,” Polk said, “the dacha is going to be well guarded. Expect ex-operators, Alpha Group, Vityaz, Spetsnaz. You know the type. Russians are assholes to begin with, but I’d expect these guys to be particularly ornery, especially when they comprehend you’re operational.”

The man on the bridge had listened to the entire CIA briefing, remaining quiet. He studied the Mariinsky Theatre, then glanced to his right, making sure no one was near him. He took a final drag on the cigarette, then flicked it into the air. He watched as the ember somersaulted through the sky and then hit the water.

Dewey wasn’t supposed to be here. Not in Saint Petersburg. Not in Russia. Certainly not listening in on a live CIA OP briefing. He was supposed to be in Arizona, at the CIA’s Sedona Clinic, a highly secure mountainside lair where operators with mental problems were sent to try to bring them back to reality. PTSD was the primary condition the doctors at Sedona treated. Dewey already knew he had it. It wasn’t the first time either. By his reckoning, Jessica’s murder, in front of him, had caused his fourth bout with the condition.

But Dewey also knew that sitting on a leather couch for six months would make him even crazier. He knew how to deal with PTSD. It wasn’t the clinical way to do it, but Dewey had forged his own unique approach. Bottle it up. Put it in a box. Bury it. Then forget about it. Cut off the memory that sent you reeling. Cut it off and kill it. Like burning down a forest, the process of eradicating his memories left him a colder, harder, meaner man. But it was the only way Dewey could go on.

He felt a hard lump pressing against his torso: Colt M1911A1 .45-caliber semiauto, eight-inch Osprey suppressor threaded to the muzzle, a strip of black hockey tape wrapped around the grip.

It had been sixteen hours since Calibrisi took him off the operation. He’d flown to Russia on a private jet, courtesy of Rolf Borchardt. He wasn’t sure why he’d come. He’d been kicked to the curb and he should’ve been pissed. And he was, but at himself. At his self-indulgence, self-pity. Most of all, his weakness.

Dewey told himself he was there for redemption. But even that wasn’t true. Deep down, Dewey knew the real reason. He had nowhere else to go. He had nothing else.

He zipped up his coat and walked toward the theater. A slightly shit-eating grin crossed his lips. They’d neglected to ask for his mission gear back, including the earbud, which now allowed him to eavesdrop on the operation. If Calibrisi or Polk knew he was listening in, he’d be disavowed forever.

“Fuck ’em,” said Dewey.

27

MISSION THEATER TARGA

LANGLEY

The mood inside the high-ceilinged, low-lit amphitheater was tense, even electric, despite the hush that kept the windowless CIA mission theater quiet.

Polk glanced at a large clock on the wall. He muted communications with the two phase line teams. He looked to his right at a man leaning against the wall, arms crossed, tie loosened, a mop of black hair combed haphazardly back: Hector Calibrisi, the director of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Two lines of desks were arrayed in front of the screens, staffed by technical managers who were there to feed the screens with whatever inputs the operation commander requested.

A dozen men and women stood along the back wall or else were seated. These were the various operations officers, collection management officers, staff operations officers, and targeting officers, there to answer questions that arose during the OP.

All attention, including Polk’s, was trained on a pair of large, brightly lit plasma screens on the front wall that were tracking the operation.

Polk moved toward the screens and put his hand on the shoulder of one of the analysts seated below it.

“Where’s the plane?” Polk asked.

The analyst, Jerry Lesesne, hit a few keystrokes. The left screen lit up. It displayed, in bright blue, a map of Ukraine extending east into Russia. An orange pictograph representing British Airways flight 319 flashed at the center of the screen.

“We cross the Russian border in four minutes, sir,” answered Lesesne.

Polk looked at Calibrisi.

“We’re about to penetrate Russian airspace, Chief,” he said, a concerned look on his face. “We need sign-off from the president.”

Calibrisi glanced at his cell. On the screen was a live CNN broadcast of President J. P. Dellenbaugh, standing on a stage, delivering a speech. He had the volume turned down. He had been following it to see when Dellenbaugh would be finished. He looked back at Polk.

“What’s the call?” asked Polk.

28

DETROIT CONVENTION CENTER

DETROIT, MICHIGAN

President J. P. Dellenbaugh smiled and waved for the fourth time as the large crowd gathered at the Detroit Convention Center continued to applaud. Finally, he held up a hand. He waited until the crowd became quiet.

“It’s great to be home,” said Dellenbaugh. Cheers arose again, but he quickly quelled them by holding up his hand. “But I want to say something serious now. I want to make a wish, and I want you all to help me.”

At the corner of his eye, Dellenbaugh saw his aide, Holden Weese, holding up four fingers. He’d been doing so for the past few minutes.

The CIA director is on the line, and it’s urgent.

“No, it’s not for world peace, or economic prosperity, or anything like that,” he continued.

Dellenbaugh was dressed in jeans and a polo shirt. His thick mane of black hair was combed neatly back. The president, who was raised in a two-bedroom Cape by a father and mother who both spent their entire careers working the General Motors assembly line down the road, had a common touch that came from the simple fact that he’d been there too. That touch was like gasoline on a fire, and the blue-collar crowd—mostly Democrats—was going nuts. Dellenbaugh was American—blue-collar American—and the annual summer meeting of the Teamsters Union let him know that despite the fact that he was a Republican, to a lunch-pail-carrying man and woman they recognized J. P. Dellenbaugh was one of them.

The crowd was hushed and quiet as they awaited Dellenbaugh’s final words.

“I want the Red Wings to win the damn cup next year!”

The crowd erupted into wild cheers.

“Thank you, Big D!” said Dellenbaugh. “Man, I love coming home. You all have a great Fourth, now, will ya.”

Dellenbaugh waved one more time to the enormous crowd, then walked offstage.

Once on the other side of the curtain, he charged behind Weese in a hard run down the hallway. He came to a secure holding room, guarded by plainclothes Secret Service agents armed with machine guns and carbines.

Inside, a military attaché in a dark blue Navy uniform held a small black briefcase, extended from which was a portable phone. Near the attaché, two men held what looked like small antennae. These were jamming devices, which would scramble the president’s conversation to anyone trying to eavesdrop, beyond the significant layers of encryption the signal would already have.

Dellenbaugh grabbed the phone.

“Go, Hector,” he said.

“Sorry for the interruption, Mr. President,” said Calibrisi. “We’ve found Cloud. I need your authority to send in some men and try to capture him. It’s a tight time frame. He’s supposed to be at a dinner party in less than an hour outside of Moscow, and it might be our only opportunity to capture him.”