incontrovertible proof-that your illegal foray into NSA territory was instigated by
Veronica Hart.”
She knew what he was asking of her. “So, basically, we’re talking an exchange of
prisoners-Hart for Tyrone.”
“You’ve grasped it entirely,” LaValle said, clearly pleased.
“I’ll have to think about it.”
LaValle nodded. “A reasonable request. I’ll have Willard prepare you a meal.” He
glanced at his watch. “Richard and I have a meeting in fifteen minutes. We’ll be back in
approximately two hours. You can think over your answer until then.”
“No, I need to think this over in another environment,” Soraya said.
“Director Moore, given your history of deception that would be a mistake on our part.”
“You promised I could leave if I told you my source.”
“And so you shall, when you’ve agreed to my terms.” He rose, and with him Kendall.
“You and your friend came in here together. Now you’re joined at the hip.”
Bourne waited until Gala was sufficiently recovered. She dressed, shivering, not once
looking at the body of the dead agent.
“I’m sorry you got dragged into this,” Bourne said.
“No you’re not. Without me you never would’ve gotten to Ivan.” Gala angrily jammed
her feet into her shoes. “This is a nightmare,” she said, as if to herself. “Any minute I’ll wake up in my own bed and none of this will have happened.”
Bourne led her toward the door.
Gala shuddered anew as she carefully skirted the body.
“You’re hanging out with the wrong crowd.”
“Ha, ha, good one,” she said, as they made their way down the hall. “That includes
you.”
A moment later, he signaled her to stop. Kneeling down, he touched his fingertip to a
wet spot on the carpet.
“What is it?”
Bourne examined his fingertip. “Blood.”
Gala gave a little whimper. “What’s it doing out here?”
“Good question,” Bourne said as he crept along the hallway. He noted a tiny smear in
front of a narrow door. Wrenching it open, he switched on the utility room’s light.
“Christ,” Gala said.
Inside was a crumpled body with a bullet in its forehead. It was nude, but there was a
pile of clothes tossed in a corner, obviously those of the NSA agent. Bourne knelt down,
rifled through them, hoping to find some form of ID, to no avail.
“What are you doing?” Gala cried.
Bourne spotted a tiny triangle of dark brown leather sticking out from under the
corpse, which was only visible from this low angle. Rolling the corpse on its side, he
discovered a wallet. The dead man’s ID would prove useful, since Bourne now had none
of his own. His assumed identity, which he’d used to check in, was unusable, because the
moment the corpse was found in Fyodor Ilianovich Popov’s room, there’d be a massive
manhunt for him. Bourne reached out, took the wallet.
Then he rose, grabbed Gala’s hand, and got them out of there. He insisted they take the
service elevator down to the kitchen. From there it was a simple matter to find the rear
entrance.
Outside, it had begun to snow again. The wind, slicing in from the square, was icy and
bitter. Flagging down a bombila, Bourne was about to give the cabbie the address of
Gala’s friend, then realized that Yakov, the cabbie working for the NSA, knew that
address.
“Get in the taxi,” Bourne said quietly to Gala, “but be prepared to get out quickly and
do exactly as I say.”
Soraya didn’t need a couple of hours to make up her mind; she didn’t even need a
couple of minutes.
“All right,” she said. “I’ll do whatever it takes to get Tyrone out of here.”
LaValle turned back to regard her. “Well, now, that kind of capitulation would do my
heart good if I didn’t know you to be such a duplicitous little bitch.
“Unfortunately,” he went on, “in your case, verbal capitulation isn’t quite as
convincing as it would be in others. That being the case, the general here will make
crystal clear to you the consequences of further treachery on your part.”
Soraya rose, along with Kendall.
LaValle stopped her with his voice, “Oh, and, Director, when you leave here you’ll
have until ten tomorrow morning to make your decision. I’ll expect you back here then. I
hope I’ve made myself clear.”
The general led her out of the Library, down the corridor to the door to the basement.
The moment she saw where he was taking her, she said, “No! Don’t do this. Please.
There’s no need.”
But Kendall, his back ramrod-straight, ignored her. When she hesitated at the security
door, he grasped her firmly by the elbow and, as if she were a child, steered her down the
stairs.
In due course, she found herself in the same viewing room. Tyrone was on his knees,
his arm behind him, bound hands on the tabletop, which was higher than shoulder level.
This position was both extremely painful and humiliating. His torso was forced forward,
his shoulder blades back.
Soraya’s heart was filled with dread. “Enough,” she said. “I get it. You’ve made your
point.”
“By no means,” General Kendall said.
Soraya could see two shadowy figures moving about the cell. Tyrone had become
aware of them, too. He tried to twist around to see what they were up to. One of the men
shoved a black hood over his head.
My God, Soraya said to herself. What did the other man have in his hands?
Kendall shoved her hard against the one-way glass. “Where your friend is concerned
we’re just warming up.”
Two minutes later, they began to fill the waterboarding tank. Soraya began to scream.
Bourne asked the bombila driver to pass by the front of the hotel. Everything seemed
calm and normal, which meant that the bodies on the seventeenth floor hadn’t been
discovered yet. But it wouldn’t be long before someone went to look for the missing
room-service waiter.
He turned his attention across the street, searching for Yakov. He was still outside his
car, talking to a fellow driver. Both of them were swinging their arms to keep their
circulation going. He pointed out Yakov to Gala, who recognized him. When they’d
passed the square, Bourne had the bombila pull over.
He turned to Gala. “I want you to go back to Yakov and have him take you to
Universitetskaya Ploshchad at Vorobyovy Gory.” Bourne was speaking of the top of the
only hill in the otherwise flat city, where lovers and university students went to get drunk, make love, and smoke dope while looking out over the city. “Wait there for me and
whatever you do, don’t get out of the car. Tell the cabbie you’re meeting someone there.”
“But he’s the one who’s been spying on us,” Gala said.
“Don’t worry,” Bourne reassured her. “I’ll be right behind you.”
The view out over Vorobyovy Gory was not so very grand. First, there was the ugly
bulk of Luzhniki Stadium in the mid-foreground. Second, there were the spires of the
Kremlin, which would hardly inspire even the most ardent lovers. But for all that, at night it was as romantic as Moscow could get.
Bourne, who’d had his bombila track the one Gala was in all the way there, was
relieved that Yakov had orders only to observe and report back. Anyway, the NSA was
interested in Bourne, not a young blond dyev.
Arriving at the overlook, Bourne paid the fare he’d agreed to at the beginning of the
ride, strode down the sidewalk, and got into the front seat of Yakov’s taxi.
“Hey, what’s this?” Yakov said. Then he recognized Bourne and made a scramble for
the Makarov he kept in a homemade sling under the ratty dash.