CHAPTER 17

Surveillance was, as a rule, not the most interesting part of any job. Kovalic glumly tore off a chunk of the compacted fruit bar and set to work chewing it. At least his jaw was getting a good workout.

They’d driven the groundcar that Esterhaus had “acquired” for them back into Salaam early the following morning, leaving before it was even light out, and deposited the general and his former subordinate in a safe house that the latter had likewise arranged.

Neither Rance nor Kovalic had been happy about leaving the general alone with the spy that he’d once burned. While Esterhaus was occupied accessing the apartment, they’d had a hurried discussion.

“I appreciate your concern,” the general had said, “but I will be fine with Yevgeniy.”

“How can you be sure he’s not another of Isabella’s contingencies?” Kovalic asked. “She seems to have tied you up into a pretty neat bow – what if that was to force you into going to him for help?”

The general stroked his beard. “I think not. Her objective was to get me out of the way, and she’s accomplished that adroitly. Besides, her strength lies in predicting my most likely behavior; I don’t think even she would predict I would turn to the very man I once betrayed.” He drew himself up slightly, eyes glittering. “I do have some surprises left in me.”

Rance hadn’t looked convinced but, at the general’s urging, the two of them had taken the groundcar to the side street in the Vrede neighborhood where Aidan Kester’s swanky brownstone stood.

They’d parked about halfway down the street, with a clear view of Kester’s front door, waiting for the man himself to make an appearance.

Rance poured a cup of coffee from a thermos and offered it to Kovalic, who accepted it gladly. He was probably mostly coffee at this point, maybe 70 percent. The other 30 percent was terrible processed food.

Ah, stakeouts.

“If Kester is the mole,” said Rance, “it doesn’t seem likely that he’s just going to lead us to his handler. He’s gotten this far undetected; why would he slip up now?”

“Agreed,” said Kovalic. Something about all of this still didn’t sit right with him, though. He’d met Kester enough times to know the man was smart, yes, and ambitious, no question. But treason? Treason was harder to square.

Then again, if he was a mole that had risen this far, then maybe he was just very very good at what he did. And there was no denying that Kester had benefited from the painstaking plan that Isabella had put into motion: the princess had funded Nova Front out of the general’s pockets, using Alys Costa and her malcontents to reveal the covert spying program that had catapulted Kester into the director’s chair, whilst simultaneously sidelining his most significant rival. The question was why? Why had she gone through all this trouble to take the general – and, by extension, the rest of the SPT – out of the equation? To what end?

That was what they had to figure out. And, no matter how Kovalic’s gut felt about it, Kester remained their prime suspect. They needed to do their diligence on the man, even if just to rule him out. That meant first establishing his routine and then figuring out how to break it – forcing him to do something that he normally wouldn’t.

About an hour after they’d arrived, a large black groundcar with tinted windows pulled up in front of Kester’s residence; it was bulkier than a standard model, a clear sign of a reinforced chassis, and the sheen off the windows told Kovalic that they’d ably resist anything short of artillery.

Beside him, Rance had raised a telescopic lens. Normally they would have used a constellation of micro-drones for this kind of surveillance, but there was too big a chance that Kester’s security detail would detect them. So, the old-fashioned method it was.

A live video feed appeared on the car’s holoscreen, springing to life between the two of them; it showed a magnified view of the people exiting the car. There were a pair of them, wearing the trademark ill-fitting suits of bodyguards everywhere, heads on a swivel as they surveyed the immediate vicinity for threats.

CID’s in-house personal security division. Mostly former operatives from the Activities group who had decided they wanted something a little less exciting, or who had been forced to drop their covert status. Kovalic had worked with plenty of Activities personnel over the years, and they weren’t people he wanted to face off against if he could help it. Rance had parked the car a good distance down the street, and fortunately, their groundcar’s windows could auto-tint for privacy, otherwise they might be having an unpleasant chat.

The bodyguards were followed by another man: pale complexion, wispy blond hair, nervous energy.

“That’s Kester’s executive assistant,” said Rance. “Lawson. I’ve dealt with him a lot, seen him around the campus cafeteria.” She wagged her head back and forth, appraising. “He’s nice enough. Asked me out once.”

Kovalic raised an eyebrow.

Rance shrugged. “Turned him down. He’s not really my type.”

He suppressed a laugh. It was hard to tell much about the man from a distance; he had an unremarkable face that looked vaguely familiar, which was probably a desirable quality in an assistant, but Kovalic had a hard time picturing him keeping up with the exceedingly competent Rance.

Then a third figure exited the car, and Kovalic sucked in a breath. Dark-skinned, with a well-kept beard, he was also wearing a serious-looking suit, but had forgone the formality of a tie. He glanced at his sleeve impatiently, then up at the door to Kester’s building, still closed.

“Shit,” commented Kovalic.

“Inspector Laurent,” said Rance. “What’s he doing here?”

“Probably briefing Kester on the search for us.”

“Well, he’s a lot closer than he thinks.”

Kovalic gave the woman a sidelong glance, then chuckled despite himself. “Fair point.” But he sobered quickly. Laurent was sharp, and Kovalic didn’t love the idea that they’d dropped themselves right back in the man’s path.

That said, his gut told him that the man was honest, too. Frankly, his gut seeming to trust everyone was starting to make him wonder how reliable an indicator it was.

Still, if they could find evidence that cast doubt upon the treason accusations, Kovalic was confident Laurent would give them a fair shake.

“Movement,” said Rance, and Kovalic put his attention back on the holoscreen. The heavy wood door to the apartment had opened and Aidan Kester, impeccably coiffed as always, stepped out onto the stoop. He had his sleeve up and was speaking into it, but without audio surveillance, they couldn’t hear him.

“We’re going to have to use the lip-reading algorithm,” said Rance. “There’s no angle with the parabolic mic where we’re not going to stick out like a flamingo in the swan pond.” She keyed something in on her sleeve, and captions began scrolling across the screen, attempting to reconstruct what Kester was saying.

“…set for 11:30…lunch…with sheaf…”

The two of them exchanged a glance.

“He keeps turning away,” said Rance, shrugging. “I’ll run a trace, see if I can figure out who he’s talking to, but the channel is almost certainly encrypted.”

The old ways might be the best, but everything had limitations. You worked with what you had. Another figure stepped into the doorway: a lanky brown-haired man with a square jaw and a fashionable amount of stubble. He smiled at Kester – genuinely, it seemed to Kovalic – and drew him in for an embrace. Kester paused his conversation and returned the gesture with equally authentic affection, squeezing the other man’s arm before heading down the stairs towards the car.

“That’s the husband,” said Rance. “Tomas Akingbola.”

Kovalic nodded. And, as it happened, the son of the Commonwealth’s Undersecretary for Foreign Affairs. By all accounts, it was a happy marriage, even if it was also politically expedient for a rising star of the intelligence community.

Or an Illyrican mole.

Rance was chewing on her bottom lip. Her eyes slid to Kovalic. “We were looking for a way to get Kester off schedule. He could be leverage,” she said, her voice carefully neutral.

Kovalic shifted uncomfortably in his seat. It wasn’t as if he’d never involved civilians in this kind of operation before – even politically sensitive ones. But this was a Commonwealth citizen, and it felt like crossing a significant line; not to mention digging them even deeper into this treason charge.

Then again, the line got blurrier when you were talking about a possible enemy agent with the potential to wreak untold havoc. “Let’s keep that in our back pocket.”

Kester and Laurent were exchanging words now, while the assistant hovered nearby, but there was no clear angle on their mouths for the lip-reading software and, after a moment, they all got into the car.

Rance waited a few beats for Kester’s vehicle to get underway, then slowly pulled away from the curb and followed after.

Kovalic spared an approving glance at Rance’s technique; she kept a couple car lengths behind the target vehicle, maintaining her speed and calmly allowing other vehicles to get in between them while still keeping sight of Kester’s car. That was helped along by the bulky vehicle being tall enough that it was kind of hard to lose, even in heavy traffic.

“Where’d you learn all of this?” said Kovalic. “Last I heard surveillance training wasn’t a requirement for yeomen.”

Rance smiled, not taking her eyes off the road. “The general’s called in some favors over the years and gotten me some crash courses: surveillance from the Bureau, computer security at NICOM, hand-to-hand combat at the School. He thought it was important, in my role, that I have a… well-rounded skillset.”

“Impressive. That’s above and beyond.”

“Well, now I’m a kick-ass assistant in every sense of the word.”

Kovalic laughed. “Touché.”

Up ahead, Kester’s car took a sudden right turn down a side street and Kovalic glanced at the map on the holoscreen. “Well, that’s interesting. Up until now, he’s been following the most logical route between his home and CID headquarters. Any chance they’ve spotted us?”

Rance frowned. “It’s possible, but I don’t think so. Could be just standard countermeasures, checking for tails.”

“Let’s take it nice and slow then.”

They eased around the corner, and Kovalic pushed down a sudden irrational fear that Laurent would be standing in the middle of the road, waiting to arrest them. But no, Kester’s car had stopped a few buildings down, and the man himself was getting out. He gestured at his bodyguard and his aide, the pale blond man, to wait for him as disappeared into one of the storefronts that lined the street.

“Should we stop?” asked Rance.

It was a damned if they did, damned if they didn’t situation. The street was only sparsely trafficked, and pulling over might be conspicuous – but if they had to pass them and circle back to pick up the tail again, that might draw attention as well.

“Keep going,” said Kovalic. Might be the wrong decision, but hesitating wasn’t going to improve matters. He reached over and hit the control to tint the windows, just in case Laurent happened to be looking out of the car at the wrong moment. “Let’s see where he stopped.”

Under Rance’s careful driving they rolled past at a respectable speed – not too fast and not too slow. As they went by, Kovalic peered at the building Kester had entered; what was important enough to merit a detour from work? Was the acting director of CID a secret devotee of pastry? Did he simply stop to pick up some groceries? Was his happy marriage an illusion and he was conducting a secret affair… that he didn’t mind his bodyguards, assistant, and a Bureau agent knowing about?

Block gilt letters arced across the shop window: “M. Habib.” Unspecific, perhaps, but more than compensated for by the understated display in the window, which showed several half-mannequins clad in elegant suits and dress shirts.

Of course.

Kovalic had never seen Aidan Kester anything less than well turned-out, so if there was one place that merited a diversion on his way to the office, it would be his tailor.

In the rearview display, Kovalic just caught sight of Kester exiting, turning back to say something. The lip-reading software caught him full-on for a fleeting second.

“…back when… ready… call me…”

And then Rance was turning onto the next street, and Kester and his detail were out of sight. Kovalic kept his eyes glued to the rearview display, but the vehicle hadn’t raced around the corner after them, and there was no sign that Laurent had spotted them.

“Now what?” said Rance, her eyes still on the road. “Do we try to pick them up again?”

Kovalic shook his head. “I think we need to consider this car burned. Let’s head back to the safe house. We’ll find another vehicle tomorrow.” He was sure Esterhaus would be glad to have his loaner back in one piece.

With a curt nod, the ever-capable yeoman started in on a complicated and labyrinthine route designed to shake any pursuers and make sure that anybody tracking the car would be utterly baffled. It was the kind of thing that would take a while, which was just fine by Kovalic, because he needed time to think.

A tailor making custom suits. It could just be an affectation of a man who took the maxim of “dressing for the job you want” to heart. But he couldn’t help but note that Kester had left both his aide and his security behind. Which also made it the perfect place for a dead drop, or a meeting with his handler. Kovalic made a note to look into it when they were back at the safe house.

One thing was clear: Aidan Kester was still at the top of their suspects list.