“Outstanding. How’s work?”
“Uneventful, as we suspected.”
“That’s good news.” The senator paused. He was waiting for the coded message Paul was required to deliver.
“I only have one complaint about this place. I can’t find a good cup of chamomile tea.”
There was a long silence on the other end. Finally, “That’s disappointing to hear. But keep looking. I have no doubt that you’ll find it, and soon. Tell Jack I said hello and send my greetings to Dr. Fairchild.”
“Will do.”
“Stay in touch.”
Paul rang off. He could hear the disappointment in the senator’s voice.
There had to be a work-around. He hoped he had the time to figure out what it was, but he doubted he had the skill.
Still, he had to try.
And if he got caught? Well, if the prison was as clean and well run as the rest of the city, maybe it wouldn’t be so bad.
—
Fuck, fuck, FUCK!
Rhodes paced around his library, his cell phone still clutched in his hand.
This wasn’t good. He was sure Paul would’ve already loaded the USB drive. He knew Dalfan’s security was tight, but Paul was smarter than any IT security department. Or at least he thought so.
And if smart wasn’t enough, luck was even better. Paul has that in spades, the fat bastard.
Rhodes stepped to the library door to make sure the maid didn’t have her ear pressed against it, even though she wasn’t due in for another hour. His young wife was off to her hot yoga class, which meant Rhodes had the place all to himself.
Rhodes retrieved his burner phone, SIM card, and battery pack and hit the speed-dial button. His father taught him a long time ago the only way to confront trouble was straight on. Unfortunately, the man on the other end was a brick wall and Rhodes was running into it headfirst.
“What’s the status?” the voice demanded.
“Still working on it.”
“Then why have you called?”
“To keep you informed.”
“Do I need to remind you that time is running out?”
“There are still four days left. I’m confident he’ll figure out a way to make this happen.”
“You know what happens if he doesn’t.”
Rhodes swallowed hard. He’d bet heavily on this operation by borrowing heavily, including a second mortgage on the McMansion he was standing in. Crashing Dalfan’s stock price was a guaranteed way for him to cash in with leveraged calls—like betting against a boxer you knew was going to throw the fight. “I’ll lose a great deal of money.”
“That’s the least of your worries.” The voice rang off.
Rhodes stared at the phone in his hand, trembling with rage.
“Or yours, asshole.”
Rhodes paced the room.
How in the hell did I get myself into this mess?
22
WASHINGTON, D.C.
TWO WEEKS EARLIER
His favorite hotel was a cozy boutique closer to the city center, but the women were always more impressed with the view of the Potomac from the seventh-story suite his family had owned for more than thirty years. Rhodes had recently updated it in mid-century modern, a phase he was going through at the time.
He stood on the balcony despite the chill air, staring at the lights of the Capitol, eager to begin the night’s festivities. The little blue pill had already kicked in, as had his first gin and tonic, and the twins from the escort service were due at any moment.
Over the years it had never been a problem for a man as handsome and well built as Rhodes to pick up women in bars, hotel lobbies, gyms, and even libraries. But the time and energy expended in the pursuit were too taxing for him now, as he balanced his role as board member of a major defense company with marriage to a young and eager trophy wife, the mother of their toddler, Weston Porter Rhodes III, his only son and heir. Better to spend his limited time and energy in the physical act of wanton sexual congress and avoid the inevitable emotional entanglements engendered in the women he seduced.
Or, as his father used to say, better to just pay for it.
Rhodes used a particularly well-stabled and discreet service called The Sorority, specializing in college coeds seeking to finance their expensive private-school educations in the Washington, D.C., metroplex. The girls in this service were also medically certified and psychologically screened. Most came from middle-class families and saw their employment as both adventurous empowerment and practical necessity.
The women he reserved for tonight were two of his favorites, partly because of their physical endowments, but mostly because of their shamelessness. The twins—in truth, Tri Delta sisters born on the same day, not genetic siblings—were pricey but worth it, and never failed to please.
They were also running late.
But Rhodes didn’t mind. It was part of their immature charm, a childish but calculated ploy to whet his insatiable appetite.
They needn’t have worried.
Just thinking about the coming revelries stirred a familiar ache in Rhodes, and the gentle ring of the doorbell nearly set him off.
He crossed the living room eagerly, brushing past the white tufted Harvey Probber modular sofa, where he intended the evening’s first consummation after drinks and, for the girls, Ecstasy. He yanked the broad door open, a lascivious smile plastered on his square jaw and a prominent erection bulging against his tight-fitting pants.
“Hello, Weston.”
Terror shot through Rhodes like a bolt of lightning.
It wasn’t the twins.
—
How?” Rhodes asked, hand still on the door handle.
The thickset man in the hallway smiled, revealing yellowed teeth nestled in a gray, well-groomed beard that matched his well-cut slacks and suit jacket. The top left corner of his forehead was hidden by a green felt fedora with a wide brim, pulled low and angled steeply.
“Aren’t you going to invite me in?”
Rhodes recognized the heavy Bulgarian accent, but it was Zvezdev’s black, piercing eyes he most remembered.
Where the hell is my SIG? Rhodes asked himself, his mind fogged and frightened all at once. In the bedroom, he remembered.
Too far away.
Zvezdev read his mind. His smile faded, his eyes hardened. “If I wanted to kill you, you’d already be dead.”
Rhodes swallowed hard. “The last time I saw you, you were dead.”
Zvezdev smiled again. “I thought so, too. Fix me a drink and I’ll tell you the story.”
Rhodes hesitated. Tervel Zvezdev was a dangerous man, and he’d found Rhodes, after all these years. Rhodes wanted to run or, better yet, strike him down.
But how do you kill a ghost?
—
They sat on the white modular couch across from each other, separated by a teak-and-glass coffee table. Rhodes absentmindedly rubbed the couch fabric with one hand, a subconscious reminder of what could have been.
Zvezdev lifted the tall glass to his lips for another sip of gin and tonic. His green felt hat sat on the couch next to him. The massive divot in the man’s forehead where his skull had been caved in at the hairline and repaired—inexpertly, in Rhodes’s mind—was now clearly revealed. The puckered skin looked like melted plastic. Rhodes tried not to stare at it. His eyes flitted between the golf ball–sized divot and the USB drive on the table glass.
“I can’t work for you,” Rhodes finally said, trying to be firm. But he saw the look in Zvezdev’s narrowing eyes and quailed. “I’m sorry.”
“Perhaps I wasn’t clear. I only need you to do just this one thing.” He smiled. “And did I mention it will make you very rich?”
“I’m a lot of things, but a traitor isn’t one of them.”
Zve
zdev shook his head. “This has nothing to do with your government, nor does it affect American national security. It’s purely business.”
“So you’re a businessman now? I remember you being a Communist, working for the Second Directorate of the Committee for State Security for the People’s Republic of Bulgaria.”
Zvezdev set his glass down. “Then you weren’t paying attention. Yes, I was a Party man with a license to kill the enemies of the state. But all that meant was that I was a businessman with a gun.”
“You mean a gangster.”
“Ha! Exactly!” Zvezdev leaned forward. “But you never really caught on, though, did you?”
“In the end I did.” Rhodes’s eyes shifted involuntarily to Zvezdev’s divot. “Obviously.”
“The Bulgarian CSS was already a criminal enterprise, and we were connected with other elements in security services all over the Eastern Bloc who were, shall I say, equally as enterprising as we were. When the Iron Curtain fell, we formed our own organization, expanding our operations and profitability as opportunities presented themselves—which they did, enormously. We’re a global organization now. If we were a legal corporation, we’d be listed in the S&P 500.”
“Glad to see you made out so well.”
Zvezdev wagged his head, grinning. “Not too bad. Of course, I have worked very hard. So many things to do these last thirty years.” The Bulgarian’s smiling eyes turned menacing. “Naturally, I wanted revenge against my enemies, and against those who had done me harm.”
Rhodes felt the blood drain from his face.
“But thirty years is a long time, Weston. I was too busy making money, fucking too many women, and having such a good time that, well, maybe I’m just an old man now, but killing for revenge seems like such a waste of time. Better to make friends and make money, yes?”
“I certainly think so.”
“Ha! Of course you do! Look at you, still handsome, still rich, right? Oh, sorry about the girls tonight. I know you had big plans.”
“Mind telling me how you knew?”
Zvezdev grinned. “Because they’re my girls! My organization runs the service you use—along with half of Capitol Hill! Ha!”
“Well, as much as I appreciate your newfound civility, and while I always want to make money, the fact of the matter is that I’m just not interested. I have too much to lose and, frankly, I’m already rich.”
“Can a man be too rich?”
“If all those millions put a man in jail, then yes, a rich man in jail is too rich.”
“Then tell me this: Can a dead man be too rich?”
“Really, Tervel? You’re going to be that obvious? You used to have more finesse.”
“If you don’t do this thing, Weston, then I’m the dead man.”
“Who would want you dead?”
“You don’t want to know.” Zvezdev didn’t dare tell Rhodes about the North Korean, or his savagery.
“And why is any of this my problem?”
“Because if I’m a dead man, well, I hate to be alone in the dark.” Zvezdev drained the last of his glass.
Rhodes turned up his hands. “Even if I wanted to help you, what can I possibly do?”
“Like I said before, install this software program.” He pushed the USB drive closer to Rhodes.
Rhodes picked it up, examined it. “I’m no techie.”
“All you have to do is insert it into a USB drive on one of the Dalfan computers. When the light turns from red to blue, you insert your own four-digit code and you’re done. Thirty seconds at most. How hard can that be?”
“And tell me again what this program does?”
“Dalfan Technologies is registered on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. The software on that drive is designed to crash the value of Dalfan stock at a specified time and date for just a few seconds—but long enough for my HFT experts to short the stock and make millions.”
“HFT?”
“High-frequency trading. Most stock transactions are done by computers these days, and the faster computers get, the better the deals. But we’ve decided we can be the fastest if we can predict the future—and get the best deal of all.”
“That’s cheating.”
“Only if we are caught.”
“I don’t know.” Rhodes set the drive back down on the glass. “I’ve been to the Dalfan facility. Their data security seems impregnable.”
“Then impregnate it.”
“How?”
“How do you impregnate any reluctant woman? Seduction. You’re good at that.”
“What does that even mean? I don’t know how to breach their security protocols.”
“Not my problem.”
“It is if I fail.”
“Then do us both a favor and don’t fail.” Zvezdev grinned. “And I think you wouldn’t mind becoming very, very rich.”
“I have a fiduciary responsibility to Marin Aerospace, and by extension, Dalfan Technologies, which we’re about to acquire, which you no doubt know, otherwise you wouldn’t be here.”
Zvezdev pursed his lips, his head bobbing. “Well, yes, a ‘fiduciary responsibility’ is something to consider. But so is this.” He pulled a smartphone out of his pocket, punched a few buttons, and handed the phone to Rhodes.
Rhodes read the screen, then reddened, angry and embarrassed. It showed Rhodes owned thousands of stock options with Marin Aerospace but he couldn’t exercise them for another three years. And even though he earned a good salary, his lavish lifestyle, two divorces, and a recently acquired gambling habit put him behind the financial eight ball. He tossed the phone back to the Bulgarian. “How did you get this?”
“The identity-theft company you’re signed up with? We own it.” Zvezdev tapped the side of his head with a thick index finger. “I know you need the money, Weston. And it’s easy money.”
Rhodes glowered at the fat Bulgarian, a pockmarked peasant from a failed state: a lesser man in every sense of the word. Yet somehow it was Rhodes who was the threadbare beggar. He resented Zvezdev’s easy smugness. This wasn’t a negotiation. The Bulgarian held all the cards, and he was broke. The only thing Rhodes hated more than treason was poverty.
Zvezdev drained his glass with a flourish and wiped his bearded mouth with his hand. He set the glass on the table. “So what shall it be?”
Rhodes sank back into the sofa, thinking. Years ago, they worked together. Zvezdev was CSS and he was CIA. Natural enemies. And yet they managed to form an uneasy partnership back then, forged in the fire of mutual self-interest. In truth, they were using each other for their own ambitions. In that regard, they weren’t so very different.
In truth, Zvezdev could’ve come in here, guns blazing. He had every right. After all, Rhodes had left Zvezdev for dead all those years ago. No doubt he had files, evidence. Things that could destroy Rhodes worse than bullets.
But the man sitting across from him seemed to bear no grudges, only gifts.
“You know, there just might be a way. I know somebody—”
Zvezdev raised his eyebrows, smiling. “Who?”
Rhodes started to say but stopped himself. He smiled. The irony was too rich. “Never mind who.”
“This man you’re thinking of can’t be traced back to me. Are we clear?”
“Who said it was a man? But don’t worry, I’m your firewall. How much time do we have?”
Zvezdev pulled on his hat, securing it over his wound as he stood. “You have until midnight on the twelfth local to do this thing. Not one second later, or the program fails.”
“That’s only a little more than two weeks from now. I’ll need more time.”
“That’s all the time we have.” Zvezdev marched toward the front door, Rhodes at his heels.
“But it’s a day’s travel just to get to Singapore from here.”
Zvezdev stopped at the door, gripped the handle. “Then you better get to it first thing tomorrow, yes?”
Rhodes frowned, worried. “No. I should probably start tonight.”
“You can’t start tonight. You’re going to be busy.” Zvezdev opened the door. The twins stood in the hallway, smiling.
Rhodes smiled back. “Hello, girls.”
“You see, Weston? I take care of my friends.” Zvezdev whispered in Rhodes’s ear. “My treat, on the house.” He winked and nudged Rhodes in the ribs. He nodded toward the girls as he pushed past them, then turned around. “And stay in touch. I need to know the moment it’s accomplished.”
Rhodes had already slipped his arms around the waists of the two busty coeds. “I will. And thanks.”
“I have a plane to catch.” Zvezdev threw him a mock salute, turned on his heel, and headed for the elevators.
Rhodes steered the twins toward the bar, wondering if the cagey Bulgarian was doing to him what he was planning to do to these girls tonight.
23
SINGAPORE
PRESENT DAY
Lian did most of the heavy lifting on the mai tai. Jack took a few sips, just to be social, after hitting his limit on beer. In the back of his lizard brain Jack wondered if Lian’s flirtation mixed with copious amounts of rum and beer might lead to something more interesting, but he pushed the thought away. He would never take advantage of an inebriated woman.
When the last of the drink was consumed, Jack paid the bill and the two of them made their way to the elevator and the subbasement floor, where her vehicle was parked.
“You okay to drive?” Jack asked.
“I think so. But just to be certain, do you mind?”
“Not at all.”
She handed him the keys as they headed back to the northeast corner of the huge garage where the Range Rover was located. It was a beautiful evening, the sushi was good, and he’d had enough to drink to feel completely relaxed without being impaired.
That’s when he heard Clark’s voice in his brain again. “Head on a swivel, kid!” He couldn’t help smiling to himself. Situational awareness was always a good idea, even in paradise.