Dewey’s eyes were blank and emotionless. He stared at the ground.

“Probability level for failure?” he whispered. “What am I, a toaster oven? Aren’t you the boss?”

“Why do you think I’m here?” asked Calibrisi. “The way to protect you is to bring you back in.”

Dewey shook his head.

“I’m not ready,” he said.

“We’ll get you ready.”

Dewey shook his head.

“I don’t want to run ops anymore, Hector. I want to be left alone.”

“That’s not an option.”

“I’ll call Dellenbaugh,” said Dewey.

“No, you won’t.”

Dewey stared at Calibrisi. His look wasn’t one of anger or even resentment. Rather, it was a look of sadness.

“Who is it?”

“His name is Gant. He’s a career Agency man. I don’t know what his agenda is. He’s clever. Machiavellian.”

Dewey looked away. He understood that Hector was there to help him, that he’d flown up to try to warn him, that he wanted to bring him back in because he cared for him. But what Hector couldn’t know was something only Dewey understood. He really wasn’t ready. He wasn’t just saying it.

“It’s a straightforward project,” said Calibrisi.

“A project?” asked Dewey. “You already have me assigned?”

“A cocaine refinery down in Mexico. You’re on a two-man team, the other guy is good. He’s already in-theater. It’ll be like riding a bike.”

Dewey stared calmly into the distance.

“It’s happening tonight,” continued Calibrisi.

Dewey turned and looked at the crowd of townspeople. He saw Doris handing Sam the winner’s trophy.

“I don’t blame you for wanting all this,” said Calibrisi, waving his arm toward the crowd gathered at the finish line. “It’s a wonderful place. But it’ll be here when you’re done. Right now, I need you back inside the fold.”

“How much time do I have?”

Calibrisi glanced at his driver. Suddenly, the car started.

“We’re leaving right now.”

3

111 EDGEMOOR LANE

BETHESDA, MARYLAND

Josh Gant stood at the island in the middle of his kitchen, holding a cup of tea and reading the morning newspaper.

Across the room, his wife, Mary, was contorted on top of a purple yoga mat, deep into her daily routine.

Gant had on a blue button-down with white collars, a yellow tie, suspenders, tortoiseshell glasses, and olive pants. He looked meticulously neat and well put together. His hair was slicked back and parted down the middle. He scanned The Wall Street Journal.

“Honey, don’t forget, we have therapy at two,” said his wife in a lockjawed Connecticut accent, her eyes closed.

Gant’s eyes shot up for a moment, a hateful look in them. Then, as if flipping a switch, a smile creased his lips.

“I have it right on my schedule, sweetie,” he said.

One of Gant’s two cell phones started ringing.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Gant, it’s John McCauley at the country club. You wanted to speak?”

“Hi, John,” said Gant. “Thanks for calling. It’s somewhat of a delicate matter.”

“You have my promise of utmost discretion, Mr. Gant.”

“Good, John. You see, it’s just that one of the men I play tennis with seems to have a problem obeying the club rules.”

“The rules, Mr. Gant? Is he … cheating?”

“No, nothing like that,” said Gant. “But he doesn’t wear whites, as club rules dictate. I mean, yes, sure, sometimes he does, but he’s just as likely to wear a pair of colored shorts or a striped shirt.”

McCauley, the Bethesda Country Club general manager, was temporarily silent.

“I see, sir. Did you have an opportunity to discuss your concerns with the member, Mr. Gant? Often I find that many issues can be ‘cut off at the pass,’ so to speak, with a few simple words.”

“No,” said Gant, “and I don’t necessarily want to. I play tennis with him.”

“Of course, I see. Would you like me to say something to the member?”

“Per club rules, I believe it is the responsibility of the rackets committee to address the issue,” said Gant, his lips flaring for a brief second as he contemplated the anonymous reputational strike he was making at the member, a player who had now beaten Gant for four consecutive years in the club singles championship.

McCauley was silent.

“Anonymity is of the essence.”

Gant’s other cell started to vibrate. He looked at the screen:

:: US SEN FURR::

Gant hung up one phone as he answered the other.

“Hello, Senator,” he said.

“We have a problem,” said Furr, the junior senator from Illinois, barely above a whisper.

“Where are you?” asked Gant. “You sound like you’re in an elevator.”

“Who the fuck cares where I am,” said Furr. “We have a problem. Someone leaked the Andreas file to Calibrisi.”

“I expected it, Senator,” said Gant. “There’s nothing wrong with what we did.”

“He’s going to rip your head off.”

“Calibrisi? I’ll be ready for him. In the meantime, you need to continue demand access to any other aspects of Andreas’s life that are even remotely questionable. The death of his first wife. His time on the oil rig. Jessica Tanzer’s death. Push it.”

“Look, Josh, I don’t like the guy either,” said Furr. “I was willing to run the psych eval, but I’m not about to start ruining his life. We’re talking about a bona fide American hero. For fuck’s sake, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom. Dellenbaugh loves the guy.”

Gant took a sip of his tea.

“You don’t get it, Senator,” said Gant. “This isn’t about Dewey Andreas. He’s a means to an end. He’s a pawn, a poker chip.”

“Yeah, I know,” said Furr. “But if he’s innocent—”

“The question is not whether Andreas is innocent,” interrupted Gant. “It’s about image. This is a political campaign. We’re going to expose a security risk at the highest levels of the Central Intelligence Agency. We’ll be notorious, Senator.”

“I’m not sure I want to be notorious.”

“Notorious is the rung on the ladder just before ubiquity,” said Gant.

There was a short silence.

“It would be a front-page story,” agreed Furr, calming down. “The American public likes their heroes until they’re exposed as something else, then they tear them down and kick them to the curb. The press would have a field day, Josh.”

“We need to be patient,” said Gant. “Calibrisi might say something, but I can handle it. We need to be patient and bide our time.”

4

PIVDENNA BAY

SEVASTOPOL, UKRAINE

A rusty light blue CMK 12.5-ton crane spewed diesel smoke out into the Sevastopol sky. The smoke blended into the thick fog shrouding the port city as dawn approached. The sun would burn off the fog by 6:00, but now, at 4:30 A.M., it hid the port well enough to obscure any possible observation from satellites overhead or Ukrainian patrol boats.

The operator of the crane sat in the cab and smoked a cigarette as he maneuvered the boom. He swept it above a flatbed semitruck. The truck was parked on a concrete pier sticking out into the ocean. He stopped the boom when the hook and ball were above a brown-skinned man named Al-Medi.

He was tall, with a thin, sinister-looking mustache, a beaklike nose, and long black hair. He was shirtless. His chest, shoulders, and torso were thick with muscles.

He was standing near the back of the flatbed, next to a wooden crate. The crate was four feet tall, eight feet long, and wrapped in thick steel cables, drawn around to a thick steel padlock on top.

“Lower!” yelled Al-Medi to the crane operator. “One foot. Hurry!”

Moored alongside the pier was a fishing boat, a 211-foot vessel built for use in deep ocean all over the world. The ship had been in dry dock for several years before its current owner purchased it, in cash, just a week ago.

Cyrillic letters spread across the bow. Roughly translated, they meant Lonely Fisherman.