“And he taught you to love it, too.”

Teren’s smile was sad as her fingers played with her glass. “Yes, he did.”

They were quiet for several minutes, during which time Miguel brought them a plate of hors d’oevres.

Alex took a slice and tried it. “Oh, this is wonderful. What kind of fish is this?”

“It’s swordfish, sliced and panfried. Glad you like it. I thought you might enjoy this a little more than a plate of calamari.”

“I’ve had squid before. It was alright.”

“I could never get the taste for it. Perry kept trying to get me to try it, and the one time I did, was right before I came down with a stomach bug. I know it wasn’t the squid’s fault, but they just aren’t pleasant memories.”

Alex laughed at the way Teren’s face scrunched up as she told about her problems with squid. It made her look like a child, and reminded Alex that there really was a person behind the cold agent she’d met.

“It’s nice to see you smile, Teren. You don’t do that enough.”

“No,” Teren agreed, “I guess I don’t do that often, do I.”

The two of them were quiet. Miguel soon returned with their dinners.

Alex quickly decided she loved Spanish food. “This is excellent, Teren. Thank you for bringing me here.”

“I’m glad you’re enjoying it.”

“How did you find this place?” Alex held up a hand. “No, wait. Don’t tell me. Perry brought you here.”

“Actually, it was the other way around. I was trying to find someplace new to take him for his birthday about three years ago. I found this place, and he fell in love with it.”

“Is that when you met Phillipe and his family?”

“Yes. Perry and I became regulars here.”

They were quiet for several minutes, both concentrating on their dinners. Alex realized she was feeling very comfortable with Teren, who seemed to have left the assassin in the car for the moment.

“So, is your family from Spain as well?”

“No, Greece. My mother was third generation American, and my father came over after World War Two. He went to Chicago, where he met my mom.”

“So, you were born in Chicago?”

“Yes, both my brother and myself.”

“So was I.”

“I know.” Teren smiled at her. “I read your file.”

Alex looked up. “You what?”

“I read your file. Graves brought it to me on Monday, before we met with you and Jackson. He thought I should see it, so I could figure out how to deal with you.”

“And did you?”

“Did I what?”

“Figure out how to deal with me?”

Teren’s smile widened. “Not even close.”

Alex had to smile back at her. “So, since you got to read my file, can I read yours?”

“That would kind of be hard since it’s classified.”

“I guess that’s a no?”

“Sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Alex was quiet for a moment as Miguel cleared their plates from the table. She poured herself another glass of wine, and then leaned forward. “Since I can’t read your file, will you tell me what happened in Eastern Europe?”

Teren stared at her. Alex stared back. Neither blinked.

“Why do you want to know about that?”

“Because you think it has something to do with this case. And I want to know what you know.”

For several minutes the staring contest continued. Alex thought maybe she had pushed the other woman too far. Then Teren lowered her eyes, and took a deep breath.

“The CIA learned of a meeting that was going to take place in a small town on the border between Lithuania and Poland. There were four groups represented, including a faction from the US. There was a group from the former Soviet Union who were selling weapons, from rifles to surface to air missiles. There was a group from inside Lithuania, who wanted those weapons, but they had little or no money. The final representative was from Asia, and his associates had a ton of opium to get rid of. They wanted to get it into the Eastern Bloc countries. The Americans had all the money, as well as connections to Nazi groups both in the United States, and Europe. They were going to buy the drugs, which would be cycled into both Europe and the states. They were going to buy the guns, and send them to the Lithuanian groups with the understanding that in return, the Lithuanians would also become drug pushers. The money made by selling the drugs on the streets would allow them to purchase even more drugs and weapons.”

Teren paused and took a sip of her wine. Alex waited, her hands crossed.

“The CIA kidnapped the two people who were going to represent the US faction. They replaced them with me and Perry. Our objective was to stop the negotiations, and cause dissension, without letting anyone know what we were doing. Before we left, it was decided that we should also kill the representative of the Asian drug cartel. After he delivered his cargo, hopefully, because then we could seize the drugs and destroy them. George was our emergency contact outside. He was to be available in case we needed a quick extraction, or we needed to get a message back to our homebase, which, for the mission, was Germany. George was placed as a bartender in a pub that was close to our meeting place. It was frequented by everyone at the meeting, so it seemed a good place to hide him — right out in plain sight, sort of.”

Alex nodded, but didn’t speak. She didn’t want to break Teren’s train of thought.

“Well, we succeeded in most of our objectives. The gun dealers didn’t trust anyone, the group from Lithuania, which actually had Nazi affiliation, was ready to pull out. We acted surprised, and upset with all of them. Then, we accomplished our second objective. We managed to slip into the room of the Asian boss, and I killed him while Perry downloaded all his computer records from his laptop. It didn’t take long, and nobody knew what was going on. In the morning, they found him dead, strangled in his bed.”

Teren finished her glass of wine, and Alex poured her another one. She wasn’t trying to get Teren drunk, but it seemed to be helping the older agent tell her story, and Alex wanted to hear the rest of it.

Teren just stared at her glass. Alex waited, nervously.

“That morning, people began to pull out of the negotiations. There were weapons drawn, and people were scared. The Asian cartel wanted to find who killed their leader, but the others just wanted to get out of there.” She took another sip. “And that’s when he showed up.”

Once again the silence stretched, endlessly. Alex finished her own wine, and still waited. When she finally couldn’t stand it, she asked, “Who showed up? Mather?”

“Well, yes, he was in the car, too, but we didn’t know that at the time. The car that pulled into the camp had the windows tinted very dark. The man who first stepped out was someone Perry and I had never seen. He wanted to talk, he said to the American representatives. Everyone could tell by his accent that he was American, and Perry and I were thinking fast trying to come up with something to say. Obviously, this man knew the people we had replaced. Sure enough, when we were pointed out to him, he laughed and said we weren’t who we claimed we were.”

Teren blew a strand of hair out of her eyes and continued. “We stared at him, and asked who the hell he thought he was. He told us, and we of course claimed he was the liar. That we knew the man, and this wasn’t him. By that time, no one knew who to believe, and everybody was standing around with their guns drawn. We figured if we just kept our cool, and stuck to our story, we’d get out of there.”

She pushed the glass of wine away, and leaned back. “And then George Mather got out of the car.”

Alex noticed Miguel heading towards their table, and she waved him off. He glanced at the serious look on Teren’s face, and quickly veered away.

“Perry and I realized we’d been betrayed. George pulled out his CIA badge, showing it off to people. He also claimed he could prove we were CIA as well. I looked at Perry and he motioned to the briefcase I had just put down. It had a bomb wired into it, that would explode five seconds after the trigger was pulled. Perry stepped forward and was trying to distract everyone while I reached down and triggered the bomb. I threw the briefcase towards George, hoping it would kill him and the guy he was standing next to.” She shrugged. “I never realized how long five seconds could take. He had time to catch it, and toss it into the midst of all the people who had gathered there. The bomb went off, and chaos erupted. If there was one thing we had done well, it was to make sure everyone there distrusted each other. The whole compound was filled with gunfire.