Just… nothing.
They’d had a difficult time finding accommodations at such a late hour. The Royal Suite at the Four Seasons Hotel was usually reserved for the Saudi royal family, but after a few discreet phone calls, they had acquired the room for the remainder of the week.
Melamid had requested coffee, and Nancy had opened the door to find the staff with a rolling cart filled with six full carafes, no cream or sugar. The old Russian carried a newspaper pilfered from the hotel lobby and commenced drinking cup after cup, standing only to use the bathroom down the hall.
“What are you thinking?” Smith asked his daughter.
She turned to him. “Waiting like this makes me want to kill someone.”
“Ah. Have you checked in with Eric?”
“They hardly need me.”
“You would be surprised,” he muttered.
Her expression changed to one of mild curiosity. “What does that mean?”
“The director shapes the office. Without care and feeding, things get…” He trailed off, trying to remember what he was about to say.
“Are you okay?”
“Just lost in thought,” he lied. “The Office needs you. Eric needs someone to lean on. It takes a toll.”
She squinted at him. “Tell me about my mother. I don’t know anything about her.”
“Maybe I didn’t tell you because I wanted to protect you.”
“Maybe it’s because you wanted to protect yourself.”
He shrugged. “I look back on it now, and I think I was… hurt. She told me who she really was after she found out she was pregnant…” He trailed off again, then remembered what he was going to tell her before. “It was during the height of the Cold War. I was losing sleep. I could barely eat. Hob was worried, but he was too busy dealing with…”
“With what?”
He shook his head. “The stress of the job is soul-crushing. Hob wanted to put me on some kind of drug, some pill he was sure would relieve my stress. My… anxiety.”
She leaned forward on the leather couch. “You suffered from anxiety?”
“I’ve always been a touch anxious. For a time, it became more than that. Maybe it was my midlife crisis. Then I recruited a young woman from the CIA.”
“My mother.”
“Yes.” He smiled, and for a moment he felt warmth in his chest. “She was so… she made me feel young again, like the world vibrated on a different frequency that I could only feel when I was with her. She was my secretary, back when I had a secretary.” He turned to look at Melamid, who slurped coffee, unaware of their conversation. “She was spying on me. Quite a coup for Vasilii. I’m sure he was ecstatic.”
“She was a plant. She was trying to turn you into an asset.”
“Of course. But then something happened. We did… what adults do.”
“Sex.”
A low chuckle slipped from his lips. “I wasn’t that old. I still knew the basics.”
Nancy rolled her eyes. “Those aren’t the details I hoped for.”
“Don’t worry, my dear. I won’t go any further. Let’s just say that what started as her mission became something else.”
“She fell in love.”
He considered that. “I’m not sure if she was truly in love. Not at first. Something about pregnancy changed her. I know it changed me.”
“How?”
“I started to question the kind of man I was. I had a habit of second-guessing myself. Suddenly that evaporated. I was sure of what I wanted, and raising you became my priority.”
“That didn’t happen, though,” Nancy said so quietly that it was almost a whisper. “You knew the Russians would use me as leverage.”
Smith nodded. “We made plans for Alex to hide until I could find a way to be together.”
“All that time you sent her packages via the dead drop?”
“Pictures, mostly. A handwritten note now and then. Remember the Holders?”
Nancy offered a rare smile. “That was the year I spent in New Jersey.”
“Fort Dix,” Smith said. “That’s correct.”
“They were… gentle.”
“They gave me your report cards. I sent them to your mother.”
Her eyes widened. “You never told me.”
“Hob was convinced it would only make it harder on you.”
An unpleasant look crossed her face. “He was, was he?”
“Would knowing I was keeping Alex abreast of your childhood have comforted you?”
“No.”
“This has been hard for you. I promise we will find your mother and all will be made right.”
“Assuming she gets your note.”
“She will,” Smith said.
“Then why hasn’t she called?” Nancy asked, pointing to the burner cell on the coffee table between them.
“It takes time, Nancy. The contact has to write a report and then pass the package to another contact. Then…”
“Then what?”
“I don’t really know. But, she will get it. She will call.”
“I have made the necessary inquiries,” Chen said on the screen. “The approval requires time.”
“My patience is wearing thin,” Huang Lei said.
“What you ask for is problematic. Very few even know of the Lotus Blossom. Which raises an interesting question. How do you?”
“A man such as yourself trades in information, Mr. Chen. I’m sure you can figure it out.”
Chen nodded slowly. “Your mole in Unit 61398. You intercepted the datastream.”
“I was receiving a copy of some of the information.”
“If you have the information, then surely you could create your own—”
“No,” Huang Lei said. “I do not have the time or resources to create my own Lotus Blossom.”
Chen offered a wan smile. “So you plan to use our Lotus Blossom? Your proposal has been so vague. Perhaps offering more details would help secure the Chairman’s approval.”
You would like the opportunity to increase your status before you fade into that long night. “I’m afraid that my initial proposal must suffice. Mr. Chen, do you love your country?”
“Of course,” Chen said.
“Such an easy thing to say, but rarely is it understood what love of country truly means. You’ve served China, you’ve sacrificed for China, but do you truly love China? You’ve been here, in the United States, fighting for so long, perhaps you’ve grown accustomed to the West.”
“I love my country,” Chen said.
“Don’t you want to see China as the dominant superpower?”
Chen’s eyes narrowed. “I do.”
“That is what I’m offering, Mister Chen. That is what I will do with the Lotus Blossom, and you will be the one to secure it for me.”
John woke to the sound of arguing in the other room. There was crust in his eyes, and his mouth felt like someone had stuffed a dirty cloth in it. He stood and stumbled to the latrine, passing the room where Deion and Valerie hunched over a laptop, clearly in a heated argument.
It has to be Eric.
He tried to make sense of their conversation, but the pressing need in his bladder made it hard to concentrate. By the time he made it into the bathroom and locked the door, he thought his bladder might actually burst. When he finally let loose into the porcelain bowl, he was shocked to see his urine was a smoky red.
Am I… pissing blood?
That meant his kidneys had suffered damage, either from the fall from the hospital window or from the fight at the border.