“Whiskey, neat. Bourbon if you have it.”

“Anything to eat?”

Dewey glanced around, trying to be calm.

“A steak, please. Rare. A bottle of wine, something red and expensive.”

“Very good.”

A small rectangle of high-backed red-leather booths framed half a dozen four-tops in the middle of the room. The lighting was dim.

A minute later, the waiter returned with a glass of bourbon.

Dewey took a large gulp and let it burn the back of his throat. He knew he shouldn’t be drinking, but right now, his priority was calming his nerves.

He pulled out the disposable cell phone and punched in a six-digit number. It was a number that could be dialed from anywhere in the world. He hit Send. A half minute of silence followed, than it rang for several seconds, before being interrupted by a high-pitch monotone beeping noise. Dewey punched in a code. The soft, sultry voice of a woman came on the line.

“Name?”

“Andreas, Dewey.”

“Flag?”

“NOC 2294-6.”

“Go.”

“Requesting encrypted bridge to NCS one, no commo. This needs to be routed over landline.”

“Hold.”

He listened to a series of clicks as his call was put through to Polk. It took almost two minutes for him to come on the line.

“Who is this?” asked Polk.

“It’s Dewey.”

There was a short pause.

“What the hell are you doing calling me through control?” asked Polk. “We’re downrange here in the middle of an operation—”

“I’m in Saint Petersburg.”

Polk was silent.

“Was that you?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“Who were they?”

“I don’t know,” said Dewey. “It was a skill job. They’re both dead. I did find out where Katya is.”

“How did you get to Saint Petersburg?”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Dewey. “I’m here and I need direction.”

There was a long silence.

“Bill?”

“What the fuck you are doing in Saint Petersburg is what I can’t get over.”

“Look, Bill,” said Dewey, “I understand why you took me off the operation. The thing is, I’m not about to go lie on some fucking couch in Arizona while my country’s under attack. This is what I was trained to do. Can you understand that?”

Polk was silent for several moments.

“Yeah, I can,” he said. “Where are you?”

“I’m at the Four Seasons, where she’s staying.”

“What do you need?”

“An encrypted patch to whoever’s running the SEAL team.”

“Sure, let me take care of that.”

“They had details of the operation,” said Dewey.

“Langley is contaminated,” said Polk. “Commo is shut down.”

Dewey’s eyes shot left. One of Katya’s bodyguards entered the restaurant. He was big, at least six-four or -five. He had a military-style crew cut, wide-set eyes, and a thick forehead that protruded slightly. He walked bowlegged, arms out to the sides. He had on jeans with a gray sweater that hugged his chest, shoulders, and torso. He looked ex-military. An operator. He scanned the room, unsmiling.

“I gotta go,” said Dewey.

“One more thing,” said Polk.

The bodyguard’s eyes roamed the restaurant, focusing first on the couples at the table in front of Dewey, a glance that lasted less than a second. Then he found Dewey. For several moments, the Russian stared across the dimly lit restaurant at him.

“What I warned you about before,” said Polk.

“What?”

“You can’t get captured, Dewey. You need to be on that SEAL Delivery Vehicle. I can’t emphasize that enough.”

“Don’t worry,” said Dewey, shifting uncomfortably under the watchful gaze of the Russian thug. “I’ll be on it.”

39

FOUR SEASONS LION PALACE

SAINT PETERSBURG

Roman, Katya’s bodyguard, sat down at the table and took out his cell phone. He started typing:

Roman:

Possible situation

Cloud:

Explain

Roman:

CIA is here

Cloud:

Take photo

Roman stood and walked to the wall, out of the line of sight of the man. He took the cell and moved the very end of the wall, where the camera lens was, just past the ornate wooden pillar, and snapped several photos without looking. He examined the photos, finding one that caught the man as he sipped a drink. Roman texted it to Cloud.

He went back to the table, where Katya was eating.

“What were you doing?” she asked.

“Nothing,” he said, placing his cell on the table as he awaited further instructions from Cloud.

40

ELEKTROSTAL

Cloud stared at the grainy photograph of the stranger in the restaurant. The restaurant was dark and the image was not good. He uploaded the photo into a facial recognition program. The computer screen scrolled rapidly through thousands of photos. After more than a minute, the words appeared:

No matches found

“Come here,” he said.

Sascha walked from his computer and looked at the photo.

“Who is it?”

“I don’t know. See if you can find anything at the hotel. A list of guests. We need to know more.”

Sascha returned to his computer.

A news flash abruptly cut across one of Cloud’s screens. It was a report from one of the Moscow television stations. At the bottom of the screen, the words:

LIVE—RUBLEVKA

Behind a news reporter, flames from the dacha lit up the distant sky. A police cordon was visible, as well as fire trucks, ambulances, and police cruisers.

Cloud stared, mesmerized, at the horrible scene he’d created. The faintest hint of sadness flashed across his eyes.

Then Sascha whistled. Cloud stood and moved quickly to him. A black-and-white photo was frozen on one of Sascha’s screens. It was the man from the restaurant. The image was much crisper.

“Where did you get this?”

“I took it off the hotel security cameras,” said Sascha.

He wore a light tan leather motorcycle jacket, BELSTAFF emblazoned across the chest. He had a mop of brown hair, parted down the middle, but roughly, as if by hand. The edges of his hair were dark with sweat. His hair went down past his ears, a slight, natural feather to it. He had a thick beard and mustache. He was handsome in a rugged way. He looked tough, even brutal, someone to be avoided. He was tan. His eyes revealed little; it was a blank expression, and yet there was no question. The way they looked forward into the camera, almost knowing the photo would be found and examined in the very manner it was being examined at this moment.

Cloud leaned closer, studying the photo. The jacket was unzipped. A thin strap was visible near the man’s neck.

“Shoulder holster,” said Cloud.

Sascha pointed at the man’s arm. A large patch of dark covered the bottom inside section of the jacket, near the wrist. The hand was dark with blood.

“Who is he?”

“I don’t know.”

“Was there any intelligence involving a third man from the CIA?” asked Cloud.

“Nothing I could find,” said Sascha. “After the explosion at the dacha, the feed went dark.”

Cloud took over the keyboard and started typing.

“What are you doing?” asked Sascha.

“Running the photo against the GRU database,” said Cloud, referring to Russia’s foreign intelligence service. “There’s a chance he’s on their radar screen.”

Cloud uploaded the photo of Dewey into the same facial recognition program. Again, the screen scrolled rapidly through thousands of photos. After half a minute, the screen froze. A photo appeared of a much younger individual, with short-cropped hair, standing on an airport tarmac. A large-caliber carbine was in his right hand, trained at the ground. He was walking point in front of a small entourage that included the former president of Afghanistan.