Roos nodded to himself as he took in a lone sailing yacht that was motoring into the harbor. “OK,” he said. “I don’t see how we have a choice here. I’ll get the Sandman to take care of it.”
“No point bringing the doc in for a chat and showing him the error of his ways, is there?”
“What’s the point of that? He’s dying anyway. I almost feel bad that we’re saving that backstabbing little shit from all the crap that’s waiting for him. I watched my dad go through it… Hell, if you ever see me about to go through something like that, do me favor and sick Sandman on me.”
Tomblin chortled. “It would be my pleasure.”
It was Roos’s turn to chuckle. “Asshole.”
“What about Reilly?”
“What about Reilly, indeed.”
Roos had wanted to deal with Reilly a few months ago, after they found out he was gunning for “Reed Corrigan”-Roos’s code name on some of the CIA projects he worked on with Tomblin, back when Roos was still an active agent. Tomblin had counseled him to wait. Reilly turned into even more of a pest when he got involved in the Sokolov affair and prevented Roos from getting his hands on the fugitive Russian scientist who’d managed to give both the KGB and the CIA the slip, the incredible-and outrageously dangerous-technology he’d invented, and the monster payday that would have ensued. Then the son of a bitch went and saved the president’s life and Roos had to back off, big time.
He wouldn’t back off now.
“I think he needs to be item two on Sandman’s to-do list.”
Tomblin seemed to demur the length of a breath, then said, “Agreed.”
“Especially now. Reilly can’t be allowed to interfere this time. But we need to be real careful with him. He’s a slippery bastard.”
“Reilly’s girl-she’s a handful too.”
“The novelist?”
“Yes. We need to make sure she doesn’t have a bone to chew on after it’s done.”
“Sandman hasn’t let us down yet.”
“True,” Tomblin said. “But like you said-she’s like him. Resourceful.”
“According to the surveillance logs, he doesn’t seem to be sharing everything with her, correct?”
“Yes. The bastard’s keeping us in the dark too, but at the same time, it just might end up being what keeps her alive.”
“If she decides to turn into a pain, we’ll just have to deal with her,” Roos told him. “In the meantime, keep me posted. And better get our lapdog up to speed too. Maybe he’ll finally start earning that retainer we’re paying him.”
“Agreed.”
Roos clicked off and looked out. The yacht was reversing into its slot. He kept his gaze on it, judging the skipper’s maneuvering.
For any mere mortal, the news was more than unsettling, but Roos had seen a lot worse over the course of his long career in the shadows. It took a hell of a lot to rattle him. He’d chuckled when he’d seen Mark Rylance’s character in Bridge of Spies repeatedly answer “Would it help?” every time Tom Hanks asked him if he was worried; it mirrored his own take on events, events that took place is a far more brutal version of the world he’d watched on screen. Calmness under fire was crucial in his line of work, perhaps the key quality an agent needed to possess. It was something Roos had mastered.
He wasn’t about to change any of his plans. He would finish his coffee, take another look at the weather forecast, then go for a jog along the dunes, like he did most every evening. He was even considering getting a dog. He’d had one when he was a boy, but his father had shot it just before they’d moved to the city.
If he did buy a dog, the only person who was going to shoot it was him. And then only to spare it the years that Roos had no intention of suffering through himself. He figured he had ten good years left-twenty if he were lucky-more than enough for the useful lifespan of a purebred.
He smiled at the continuing years of uninterrupted leisure stretching out in front of him. He firmly believed he’d earned them many times over. And nothing-nothing, especially not Sean Reilly-was going to interfere with that.
7
Lower Manhattan, New York City
We were all at the Beekman, one of our favorite haunts, a family-run Irish pub that purportedly served the best pint of Guinness in the entire city. Not that I would know. I was enjoying my second ice-heavy Coke, the decision not to drink having already earned me an hour of slating from the more old-school agents.
Our boss, Ron Gallo, hadn’t even bothered to show. No surprise there: the Assistant Director in Charge of the New York Field Office was the kind of leader who thought getting down and dirty with the troops would lower him in their estimation. As if that were possible. He and I had little time for each other anyway. I don’t know if it was due to his particularly poor management skills, although he ticked all the boxes: anger fits, hogging credit, going back on his word. He just exuded that smarmy, insincere, politically astute career focus that made me picture a weasel every time I saw his elongated, narrow-eyed face.
I was still weary from all the overnight stints in New Jersey, for sure-that, and that damn phone call. It was still weighing heavily on my mind when I felt a hand on my shoulder and turned to find myself facing Special Agent Annie Deutsch. I knew only rudimentary facts about her due to her being the most recent addition to the office. Right now, she was smiling, the cocktail in her left hand and the general camaraderie around us having obviously served to loosen her attitude. I feared for her around Nick. Although she was a petite brunette and thus didn’t conform to his usual bombastic type, he’d commented on her attractiveness a few times already.
“Agent Reilly?”
“Agent Deutsch.”
I detected the stirrings of a smile. “It’s Annie.”
“Sean.”
Her eyes sparkled with that same elusive combination of intelligence, wit and lightly worn acceptance of a sure-fire ability to attract attention that I found so appealing in Tess.
She leaned in and whispered, close to my ear. “I need to get away from Lendowski. He seems to think I want his tongue down my ear.”
I looked around. I could see Lendowski laughing loudly a few feet away from us, his leer locked on Deutsch. “Why me?”
I was only half joking.
Lendowski’s often-embarrassing exploits with the ladies were widely known within the Bureau, mainly because he insisted on sharing them with anyone who would listen. He made Nick look like a monk. Lendowski had narrowly avoided at least three sexual harassment charges, and he always seemed to emerge looking like the victim, which was no mean feat for a guy who wouldn’t look out of place on the WWE Network. He also loved to gamble, maybe even more than he loved annoying women.
The question seemed to throw her a bit. She hesitated, then said, “Because you’re standing here.” She paused again before adding, “And because of how she describes you.”
“Huh?” I had no idea what she was talking about.
“You’re Jim, right? Mia’s knight errant?”
I shook my head and chortled. “Oh, Jesus.” It was going to happen eventually, but the longer time passed without it happening, the more I had started to believe that it wouldn’t.
Once she had heard that Tess was a bestselling novelist, it wasn’t much of a leap for her to deduce that the male hero of her first two books was modeled in some way on Tess’s very own man of action. The hazing about this was merciless with each new book, especially since Jim Corben had a goatee and lived on a cattle ranch when he wasn’t traveling the globe on archaeological adventures at the behest of a mysterious secret society.
“Well, for starters, I’m no cowboy.”
She tilted her head to one side. “And I ain’t no buckle bunny either.” Her faux-Texan accent was pitch-perfect, then Lendowski planted a hand on her arm.