“I’ll stay at my office. If you get a chance, please call. Pretty exciting stuff, Kyle.”

“Exciting? How about terrifying?”

“You’re the man.” With that, Roy exchanged briefcases again and disappeared.

For sixty minutes, Kyle stared at the clock, did nothing but bill Trylon for an hour, and finally made a move. He loosened his tie, rolled up his sleeves, tried to look as casual as possible, and took the elevator to the eighteenth floor.

Sherry Abney was in the room, and he had to say hello. From the looks of her table, she’d been there for hours and the research had not gone well. Kyle chose a station as far away from her as possible. Her back was to him.

Despite his bitching and moaning, he foresaw little danger of being noticed by another member of Team Trylon. All ten chairs faced the outside walls, away from the center, so that while doing research, he could see nothing but the monitor, the computer, and the wall behind it. The danger was up above, lurking in the lenses of the video cameras. Still, he preferred to have the room to himself.

After fifteen minutes, he decided to visit the men’s room. On the way out, he asked Sherry, “Can I get you a coffee?”

“No, thanks. I’m leaving soon.”

Perfect. She left at 8:30, a nice breaking point that always made billing easier. Kyle placed a legal pad on top of the computer, then a couple of pens, things that could roll and slide and need retrieving. He scattered a couple of files beside the monitor and in general made a mess of things. At 8:40, he knocked on the locked metal door that led to the small printing room, and there was no answer. Then he tried a second metal door that led to places unknown, but he suspected it was the room where Gant hung out and secured things. He saw Gant occasionally and figured he worked close by. There was no answer. At 8:45, Kyle decided to plunge ahead before another associate arrived for one last hour of work. He walked to his table and bumped the legal pad on top of the computer, sending the pens flying against the wall. He threw up an arm, said “Shit!” as loudly as possible, then leaned over as if to retrieve things. He found one pen, couldn’t find the other, but kept searching. On the floor, behind the monitor, under the chair, then again behind the computer, where he deftly inserted the tiny transmitter into the USB port just as he found the missing pen and held it up so the cameras could see it. Settled down now, composed, not cursing, he took his seat and began clicking away at the keyboard.

He slid the briefcase closer under the table, directly under the computer now, then he flipped the switch.

No alarms. No virus warnings screaming from the screen. No sudden entry by Gant with armed guards. Nothing. Kyle the hacker was downloading files, stealing at a dizzying rate of speed. In nine minutes, he transferred all Category A documents — letters, memos, a hundred different varieties of harmless information that had already been submitted to APE and Bartin. When he was finished with the Category A documents, he repeated the process and downloaded them again. And again, and again.

An hour after he entered the room, he again went through the charade of searching for lost pens, and while bumbling about, he plucked the transmitter from the USB port. Then he cleaned up his mess and left. He hurried to his office, got his jacket and trench coat, and made it to the elevators without seeing another person. As he rode down without a single stop, he realized that this was the moment he had always feared. He was leaving the office as a thief, with enough stolen files in his briefcase to get him convicted of numerous crimes and disbarred for life.

As he stepped into the raw December night, he immediately called Bennie. “Mission accomplished!” he said proudly.

“Great, Kyle. Oxford Hotel, corner of Lex and Thirty-fifth. Room 551, fifteen minutes away.”

“I’m on the way.” Kyle walked to a black sedan, one duly registered to a well-known car company in Brooklyn, and jumped into the backseat. The small Asian driver said, “Where to?”

“And your name is?”

“Al Capone.”

“Where were you born, Al?”

“Tutwiler, Texas.”

“You’re the man, Al. Oxford Hotel, room 551.”

Al the Agent immediately called someone and repeated the information. He listened for a few minutes, drove very slowly, then said, “Here’s the plan, Mr. McAvoy. We have a team on the move, and they should be at the hotel in ten minutes. We’ll take our time here. When the supervisor is in the hotel, he will call me with more instructions. Would you like a vest?”

“A what?”

“A vest, bulletproof. There’s one in the trunk if you’d like.”

Kyle had been too preoccupied with his thievery to contemplate the actual events surrounding the arrest of Bennie, and hopefully Nigel, too. He was sure he would lead the FBI to his handler, but he had not given much thought to the details of his betrayal. Why, exactly, might he need a bulletproof vest?

To stop bullets, of course. Baxter flashed through his overheated brain.

“I’ll pass,” Kyle said, realizing how ill equipped he was to make such decisions.

“Yes, sir.”

Al looked for traffic, for detours, anything to burn some clock. His cell phone rang and he listened, then said, “Okay, Mr. McAvoy. I’ll stop in front of the hotel, and you’ll walk into the lobby alone. Go to the elevators to the right, and punch the button for the fourth floor. Get off on the fourth, turn left, walk to the door leading to the stairs. In the stairwell, you will meet Mr. Bullington and several other agents. They will take over from there.”

“Sounds like fun.”

“Good luck, Mr. McAvoy.”

Five minutes later Kyle walked into the lobby of the Oxford Hotel and followed his instructions. In the stairwell between the fourth and the fifth floors, he met Joe Bullington and two other agents, all dressed exactly like the ones who’d snatched him some ten months earlier after a youth basketball game in New Haven. Except these were real, and he had no desire to inspect their credentials. Tensions were high, and Kyle’s weary heart was pounding furiously.

“I’m Agent Booth, this is Agent Hardy,” one said, and Kyle was impressed with how large they were.

“Go to the door of 551,” Booth said. “The second it starts to open, kick it very hard, then jump back out of the way. We’ll be right behind you. We do not anticipate gunfire. We assume they’re armed, but they’re not expecting trouble. Once we’re inside, you’ll be removed from the scene.”

What! No gunfire! Kyle started to crack a funny, but his knees were suddenly weak.

“Got it?” Booth growled at him.

“Got it. Let’s go.”

Kyle entered the hall and walked with as much confidence as possible to room 551. He pressed the button, took a deep breath, and glanced around. Booth and Hardy were fifteen feet away, ready to spring, shiny black pistols drawn. From the other end of the hall, two other agents were approaching, also with guns visible.

Maybe I should’ve opted for the vest, Kyle thought.

He pressed the button again. Nothing. Not a voice from within, not a sound.

His lungs had ceased working, and his stomach was a mess. The briefcase weighed a ton, much heavier now that it contained the stolen files.

He frowned at Booth, who looked perplexed as well. Kyle pressed the button for the third time, then tapped on the door and yelled, “Hey, Bennie. It’s Kyle.”

Nothing. He rang the doorbell for the fourth time, then fifth.

“It’s a single room,” Booth whispered. Then he motioned for some type of well-rehearsed formation and said to Kyle, “Please step aside. Go right down there and wait.” Hardy whipped out an electronic room key and inserted it. The green light came on, and the four FBI agents stormed in, high and low, right and left, barking, guns aimed in all directions. Joe Bullington was running toward them, and behind him were more agents.