“So you’re still beating yourself up?”
“No. I evened the score for them, but it’s happened before. Too often.”
“And you’re afraid that I’m next?”
“I know you are,” McGarvey said.
“My tradecraft is pretty fair. And I’m a good shot.”
“I know that too.”
“You let me tag along to the embassy tonight. So what’s your point? Do you want me involved, or do you want to keep me locked up somewhere until this business is finished? I’m a field officer. If you don’t want me in this thing that’s your prerogative. But if you don’t want me to be involved with you, you’re out of luck. Fact of the matter is, I love you, and I have a feeling that if you would admit it for just a New York minute you’d realize that you were in love with me.”
But he didn’t have a New York minute. He wouldn’t allow himself the introspection, even though he had to admit that he would have been in big trouble off Casey Key if she hadn’t taken the shot. “Not yet.”
“You mean not this time. But you’re going to Pakistan, and if you survive there’ll be another time. And another. It’s what you do, who you are. One of the reasons I fell in love with you in the first place.”
“Leave it be, Pete.”
“I can’t. So now it comes down to, am I going to Pakistan with you, or am I staying here in Washington?”
McGarvey had given that question a lot of thought over the past day or so, in part because he hadn’t entirely made up his mind to take what would be the most impossible assignment of his life, but also because he knew that he would have to give Pete an answer that made sense to her.
“If I go, Otto will have to backstop me, and the ISI will know it. To stop me they’ll go after Louise, and Otto will have to jump in and they’ll get him too. I’ll need you here to ride shotgun for both of them.”
Pete wanted to object, but she couldn’t and it was obvious from her expression. She nodded.
McGarvey telephoned Otto and brought him up to date.
“Interesting choice for PM.”
“Dave Haaris showed up.”
“I expected he would,” Otto said. “Was he surprised by Rajput? They worked together for the past couple of years.”
“He didn’t seem to be; in fact he publicly accused the ISI of murdering his wife.”
“Let me guess, he even told them that he was going to change his policy advice on Pakistan.”
“Something like that. Anyway, the ambassador tossed him out, and John Fay made his apologies.”
“What about you?” Otto asked.
“I don’t know.”
“That’s not like you, Mac.”
“I’m still figuring out how to find this Messiah, whoever the hell he is, and then get the hell out with my hide intact.”
“Are you coming over in the morning?”
“I’m going to stick it out here, take a run in the park, and pack a few things for Casey Key.”
“With a big target painted on your back.”
Pete took a shower first and over McGarvey’s objections made up the couch. “I’ll get out of here first thing in the morning,” she said. “I want to have a little talk with Haaris.”
“Do you want me to drive over with you?”
“I’m a big girl, but thanks for putting me up for the night.”
After his shower he took a turn at the front window for a few minutes to make sure no one was out there. Pete was apparently already sleeping, because she didn’t look up. And ten minutes later he was just drifting off, when she came to the bedroom door.
“It’s me,” she said softly, as he automatically reached for the pistol on the nightstand.
“Is something wrong?”
“I’m not sleeping alone tonight,” she said. She took off the shirt and slipped into bed with him. “Don’t send me away.”
She came into his arms, and her softness, her breasts, the feel of her legs against his, her breath on his face as she kissed him, were as good as he’d imagined they would be. And they made love, slowly, elegantly, even though he could feel the same urgency in her as he felt in himself. And in the end he almost lost his fear for her life.
TWENTY-SIX
Pete got up shortly before dawn and after she got dressed she went back into the bedroom, where McGarvey was lying awake. “I’m sorry I woke you,” she said. She’d not slept well the entire night, worrying about him going into badland.
“I’m usually up by now.”
“Not at five in the morning, liar.”
“Do you want me to follow you back to your place?”
“No, but I’m going to borrow one of your guns, just in case. I want to get to the Campus before Dave Haaris does.”
McGarvey sat up and handed her the Walther he usually kept by his bedside. “Watch the corners.”
“Yeah,” she said, stuffing the small pistol into her purse. She bent down and kissed him on the cheek. “Thanks for last night, Kirk.”
“It was a two-way street,” he said. “Why the hurry to talk to Haaris this morning?”
“I want to know why a man like him is so eager to get back to work even before his wife is in the ground.” The instant the words left her lips she realized what she had just said and to whom she had said them. “Oh, Christ, I’m sorry.”
“Don’t ever be sorry for asking a legitimate question. I’ve asked myself the same thing for a long time now, and the best I could come up with is revenge. Plain and simple. Get the bastards who did it.”
Pete sat on the edge of the bed. She could feel heat coming off his body, and the sight of him so close, his chest bare, started to arouse her. Sometimes field officers who were in love backed each other up when all hell was raining down on their heads, but too often their feelings put them in danger. They dove in to save someone who could not be saved and lost their lives or their freedom.
“Something’s not right with him. Working with Rajput and then suddenly accusing him of ordering the killing? Especially like that in public. What was he trying to accomplish?”
“He was pushing the general to see what kind of a reaction he’d get.”
“He got nothing, at least nothing as far as I could tell.”
“Haaris is a professional.”
“So am I,” Pete said. “Everything I’ve seen in his jacket gives him high marks. Page says the guy’s sophisticated. Old-world educated. Last night’s display was anything but. I want to know why.”
“Maybe I should go in with you.”
Pete shook her head. “Let’s keep up normal routines. It’s my job for the Company to find out what’s eating people. Your job is to sleep in, have breakfast and take your morning run. Everything as usual.”
“I’ll come out later this morning, I need to work out a few things with Otto, and talk to Walt and probably Marty.”
Pete looked at him in the dim illumination from the night-light in the bathroom. He seemed calm, at ease with himself, despite what he was facing. This time she didn’t think it would be quite so simple for him as going up against an assassin somewhere, or even an organization, like the group who’d tried to kill all the SEAL Team Six guys who’d taken bin Laden down. That had been a German terrorist group, all ex-military special operators who’d been hired by the ISI. This time, he would be taking on an entire nation, with just about every other person over there wanting to kill him.
“I might have something to add,” she said.
“Watch your back,” McGarvey said.
“You too,” Pete told him, and she almost said “darling.”