Driver stood watching from the church rooftop as Lim sped away with Chiang. ‘Was that part of your plan too?’ she asked Tom.
He shook his head in reply. ‘Whoever she is, she’s not with me. A public execution would have been better. But I guess we can still link it to the Agency.’
‘So that was the plan,’ Driver said. ‘You assassinate the minister, pin it on the CIA and draw the Chinese into direct conflict with the US.’
‘Every war needs a push,’ Tom said. ‘A bombing would have been a tidier fit with Washington and Moscow. Same MO, easier to string together… But always have a backup plan.’
Driver was getting sick of Tom’s vague rhetoric. ‘How long were you lying to me?’ she asked. ‘When did you turn?’
‘Oh, before I met you,’ Tom said. ‘You just couldn’t see it.’ He took a step towards her with the pistol. ‘Serik wanted you dead, you know. I wouldn’t sanction it.’
‘So that’s why you drew the X on the pair of us. To mark us out.’
Tom nodded. ‘So they wouldn’t target us, yes.’
‘You should have let them shoot me,’ Driver said. ‘It would have been kinder.’
Tom let out a sigh, as if she was ungrateful. She wanted to grab that gun and ram it up his – No, it wasn’t the time for that.
‘So you going to tell me who you work for?’ Driver asked.
Tom laughed. ‘No one – it stops with me, honey.’
‘Bullshit. You may as well tell me. You’re going to kill me anyway, right?’
‘Let’s just say they’re people with deep pockets,’ Tom said, ‘and the desire to get things done. When they found me I was in a dark place. They showed me the light.’
‘You mean they brainwashed you.’
‘No, Sam, they woke me up.’
Driver shook her head. ‘Man, you really drank the Kool-Aid, didn’t you?’
She couldn’t believe a man like Tom – a decorated SEAL team commander – could be so easily duped. Yet wasn’t that the way it always happened? Terrorists didn’t pluck suicide bombers from the emotionally nourished. And Tom had admitted in the past to bouts of depression as a teen. Driver felt she should have picked up on the signs. But love was blinding. Now she almost felt pity for him, and perhaps he could still be saved. ‘It’s not too late, Tom. There’s still time to come back over.’
‘And there’s still time for you to join us,’ Tom replied, dashing her hopes.
Driver couldn’t help but laugh. ‘My God, to think I was going to marry you.’
‘Look at you,’ Tom said. ‘Clearly you’ve been railroaded into some crackpot, clandestine scheme. Probably by the same agency who abandoned and betrayed you in the first place. Am I right?’
‘Oh, you want to talk about betrayal?’ Driver said.
‘I did it for a higher cause. That’s what brought us together in the first place.’
‘And tore us apart,’ Driver said.
‘I just finally figured out whose side I should be on,’ McNeil said.
‘Whose side are you on, Tom? Vesuvius?’
Tom wore a look of surprise. ‘How do you know that name?’
‘Your guy, Fuller,’ Driver replied. ‘What is that, some kind of secret cabal? Powerful old men who want to take over?’
‘Men and women who want to leave a legacy,’ Tom interjected.
‘I expect they’ll be tucked up in their bunkers while you and the rest of the world burns.’
Tom’s face flashed with anger. ‘You don’t know what you’re talking about.’
From the look in his eye, Driver figured she was hitting close to the truth, as well as touching a raw nerve. ‘Are we talking people in government?’ she probed. ‘On the Hill? In the corporate sector?’
‘We’re talking everywhere,’ Tom said with a smug air. ‘We could do with someone like you, Sam. A woman with your profile, you’d be welcomed with open arms. And appreciated, too. It’s not like back home.’
Driver snorted. ‘You make it sound like a job at Google.’
‘Come on, Sam. You know in your heart I’m right.’
‘I know you’re fucking insane.’
Tom tightened his grip on the gun, wrestling with himself. ‘Damn you for making me do this.’ He dropped his arm to his side, as if he couldn’t do it, then shook his head. ‘Goodbye, Sam.’
Tom raised the weapon and squeezed off a round.
Driver flinched at the pop of the gun. She couldn’t help it, even though she knew that it could do her no harm.
Tom stared at the barrel of the smoking pistol.
‘Darn it,’ Driver said, a hand to her mouth. ‘I forgot to take out the blanks.’ She put a finger to her ear. ‘Cornerstone, you get all that?’
‘Got the whole thing,’ Anna said.
Driver looked up to the sky over her shoulder. The Black Hornet drone buzzed over her head. Tom watched, slack-jawed, as it flew across the rooftop and over the piazza, returning to the surveillance van.
‘Like you said, always have a backup plan,’ Driver said.
Tom’s face darkened. He threw away the pistol.
‘Take him down,’ Gilmore said.
‘With pleasure,’ Driver said.
Tom launched into an attack. She ducked the first punch, struck him in the ribs and followed through with the same fist into his jaw. He staggered as Driver kicked him backwards, but regained his balance, blocked the next two blows and countered with a winding strike to the sternum. A lightning-quick punch to the face came next. Driver hit the floor, dizzied with the taste of copper in her mouth.
Tom moved to finish her off, yet she spun on her back, swiped his legs from under him and leaped to her feet. As Tom picked himself up, they circled each other, took a breath and went in for a second round.