It was midnight. Jason and Abbey lay in darkness in a budget motel two hours south of Washington. He’d ditched the Jeep—it was too easy for the police and others to trace it from cameras in the parking garage—and he’d stolen a dented Ford Bronco and swapped out its license plates. Over Abbey’s objections, he’d taken her to see a discreet doctor he’d used on missions in the past. The doctor had checked her out for any serious effects of the shock waves rippling from the car bomb, and then he’d given her an all-clear.
But Abbey was still fragile. Jason knew that. The shock waves she felt now were more than just physical. She lay naked on her back beside him, although her body was nearly invisible in the lightless room. They’d purchased new clothes for both of them at a Walmart in Fredericksburg, and after changing in an I-95 gas station, they’d discarded their old clothes, which smelled of char and gasoline. At the motel, he’d helped her in the shower to remove shards of glass from her hair, and then he’d rebandaged the cuts and abrasions she’d received.
During all that time with him, she’d said almost nothing. Now he listened to her breathing in bed, but he knew she wasn’t asleep.
“How did you know?” she finally murmured. “I mean, about the bomb. How did you know?”
“As the engine started, I saw a red light go on under the car. I guessed it was wired.”
“Tom was part of them. He was part of the Pyramid. Why did they kill him?”
“Loose ends,” Bourne said. “They must have realized you’d make a connection to Tom, and you’d figure out a way to leverage him. They couldn’t let that happen.”
She was quiet again for a while, but still she didn’t sleep.
“You heard what he said, didn’t you?” she went on a couple of minutes later. “About taking sides in a Senate race? I think he meant last year’s special election in Georgia. A conservative candidate had to drop out, and Sadie Adamson won. It makes me wonder. Did the Pyramid do to him what they did to me? Make up lies?”
“Maybe,” Bourne said. “If we could prove that, it might help us.”
“I have a friend in Atlanta. A reporter, Canadian like me. We both went to McGill, and he worked with me at The Fort for a couple of years. He covers Georgia politics now. We should talk to him.”
Jason hesitated. “I think it would be better to take you somewhere where you can hide out for a while. I want you safe.”
“Is anywhere safe for me right now?” she asked.
He frowned. “No. Not really.”
“Then why even suggest it, Jason? After what they did to me, I’m not walking away.”
“I’m not saying walk away, but you’ve seen what these people are willing to do. This isn’t just about your reputation or career. This is your life. I can go after them, but if you’re with me, you’re in danger every moment. Plus, in order to stop them, I may have to do things you don’t want to see. You said the media was your world, not mine. Well, this is my world. I don’t want you to be a part of that. You’re better off without me.”
“Without you, I’d be dead,” Abbey insisted.
“Without me, you’d probably be in Quebec City living a happier life.”
She reached out and took his hand. “I don’t regret any of it. Not two years ago. Not now. I already told you not to try to put me off.” She hesitated, then spoke out of the darkness again. “Mistake or not, I have to say this, Jason. I’m in love with you. You understand that, don’t you? It was true back then, and it’s still true. Nothing’s changed for me. Seeing you again, it’s only gotten stronger.”
“Abbey—”
“You don’t have to say it back. I doubt you can even admit it to yourself. But that doesn’t matter. I haven’t stopped thinking about you for two years. I couldn’t let go of you, even after you let go of me. And yes, I know what you said and why you walked away. I know the risks. I know the man you think you are.”
“I am that man,” Bourne said. “I’m a killer. You’ve seen it.”
“I also saw you save my life. I saw you go into a frenzy because someone was trying to kill me.”
“That was instinct,” he lied.
“Fuck that. I don’t believe that. You don’t have to say it out loud, Jason, but I know you love me, too.”
He wanted to deny it. He wanted to tell her she was wrong. His feelings for Abbey were radioactive for both of them. Having her in his life could end only one way, with her dead because of him. With her killed because he couldn’t let her go again. But he also couldn’t lie to her. He could only hide the truth.
“You haven’t seen me in two years,” he said. “Two years! You don’t even know me anymore.”
“Don’t I?” He heard the rustle of sheets on the bed and felt her body shifting. In the shadows, Abbey propped herself up on an elbow beside him. “Then tell me what happened during those two years.”
“What do you mean?”
“Tell me what you went through. I know you can’t tell me everything, but you can tell me some things. I know you live in Paris. Do you think I didn’t wonder every day about flying over there and trying to find you? About tracking you down somehow and forcing you to deal with me? So tell me about your life.” She stopped, as if trying to find the words for a new thought that had come into her head. “Was there someone else? Is there someone else? Is that why you’re hesitating?”
Jason pulled her naked body into his arms, and she settled against him. Her head rested in the crook of his neck and shoulder, and he smelled her hair, which was floral and familiar, the way it had been in the past. He tried to decide what to say, what was safe to say.
His instincts screamed: Say nothing! Anything you tell her will put her at risk.
But Jason was a loner by necessity, not by choice. His first love, Marie, had known that about him. Being with Abbey made him want to unburden himself and tell her everything. There was something about her that made him trust her, and there was no one else in his life—no one, not a soul—that made him feel the same way.
Nothing gets you killed faster than trust.
Treadstone.
“Do you remember me telling you about Nova?” he asked.
“Of course. You worked with her at Treadstone. You were in love with her. It was obvious in how you talked about her. I could see that. But she was killed in that mass shooting in Las Vegas.”
Jason hesitated. “Nova is alive.”
“What?” Abbey’s head lifted off his shoulder. “How is that possible?”
“The details aren’t important. I found out last year. I saw her last year.”
Abbey slid away from him to the other side of the bed, and her voice cooled with embarrassment. “Oh. Okay. You two are together again. Sure, naturally, of course you are. Holy shit, I feel stupid.”
Jason followed her across the bed. He reached to turn on the light, which made them both squint. He needed to see the expression on her face, which was what he expected. She was hurt, regretful, and jealous. Her lower lip trembled as she held back tears. She reacted stiffly when he slid an arm under her shoulders, but he didn’t let her pull away.
“You’re wrong,” he said. “Nova and I aren’t together. I only told you she’s alive because you deserve the truth, not because I was trying to push you away.”
“Come on, Jason. I already told you, I’m a big girl. You were head over heels for this woman. Why would I expect anything to be different when you found out she was alive? I’m happy for you. Really.”
He shook his head. “It wasn’t the same between us. Yes, we became involved again. Very briefly, and in circumstances I can’t tell you about. But Nova knew I didn’t love her anymore. We aren’t together, and we never will be.”
“Why not?”
Jason took a breath and crossed a line that he’d sworn he would never cross again. He knew it would end badly, but he did it anyway. “Why do you think, Abbey? Because of you.”
Her eyes widened. “What?”
“Nova said everyone I love, I push away. And that’s what I was doing with you.” He ran his hands through her hair. “She was right.”
“What does that mean?” Abbey asked softly.
“It means I’m a fool. It means you should be anywhere else but where you are right now.”
“I am exactly where I want to be right now,” she told him.
“Abbey, I’m taking chances with your life that I have no right to take.”
“It’s my life. I’m the one taking the chance, and I don’t care.”
She put her hands on his face, and she brought her mouth to his, and they kissed. It had been two years since they kissed. That was on the boardwalk in Quebec City, that last night when they’d said goodbye. And nothing had changed. It felt soft and wet and erotic and perfect. They kissed until they were breathless and both wildly aroused.
“Turn off the light,” Abbey murmured when they finally broke apart. “Quickly, quickly, turn it off.”
“Why?”
“Because I like to make love in the dark, and I need you inside me right now.”
The fire! Children died!
Oskar kept hearing Louisa’s words in his head. He’d been in a daze ever since he saw the video she made for him, because she’d ripped out the props holding up his whole life. Could it really be true?
The institute killed me! They are killers, Oskar!
Louisa. She’d confessed to him from the grave. How could she have been part of something evil like that? What lies had she told? And what had he done? He’d spent the past three years creating the most ingenious of lies himself, because they’d sworn that it was in service of a good cause. But God in Heaven, was that the worst lie of all?
Oskar leaned against the wall of a convenience store, located across from the concrete monstrosity that was the institute building. He could hardly bring himself to cross the street and go to work. He chewed gum with his jaw pumping until it lost all flavor in his mouth. Commuters passed in front of him, going both ways on the sidewalk, and he glanced at their faces to see if anyone was paying special attention to him.
Were they still following him?
Was someone watching him right now?
Act natural. Don’t let them know you suspect anything.
He swallowed his gum and crossed to the building entrance. They checked his ID badge, and he joined the others heading to work. Most of the people around him went to the other floors, where they dealt with normal things like grant proposals and press releases, but Oskar had a special access card for the eighth floor. That was the part of the building where the secret work got done.
Jochim was already at the desk next to his. He looked as if he’d been at work for several hours. The fat, bald programmer gave Oskar a wink, but he made no small talk. That wasn’t allowed, other than the occasional conversation through the walls of the toilet stalls. Jochim whistled under his breath to music coming through his earbuds, and he tapped on his keyboard at lightning speed with his thick fingers. He wore an untucked red shirt, and his jutting stomach looked ready to shoot off the buttons like missiles.
As Oskar logged in to his computer, he heard a whisper.
“Hey.”
He glanced at Jochim with concern, because he couldn’t remember the man ever speaking to him out loud where others could hear them. His nerves were on edge, and everything made him suspicious now. Rather than saying anything, Oskar simply cocked his head at his coworker to see what he wanted.
“Hey, you want a slice of stollen?” Jochim asked. “I’m starved. There’s a new bakery a couple of blocks away. Thought I’d try it out.”
Oskar sighed in relief. “Danke, nein.”
The other programmer shrugged. Jochim hoisted his bulk out of his chair and shouldered his way to the elevators. Oskar had no appetite for food, but he did need caffeine, so he went to the coffee counter near the toilets and poured himself a cup. He sipped it for a minute before returning to his desk, and he kept thinking about Louisa.
I’m part of the lies. I’ve helped spread those lies.
What did she mean?
He had to know what Louisa had done, but he didn’t think it was safe exploring the institute’s computers. If they were watching him, following him on his way home, then they would probably be watching his institute account, too. They’d track his keystrokes, monitor any searches or downloads he made, and they’d know immediately that he was poking around in areas he shouldn’t be.
Then a thought occurred to him.
Jochim’s desk sat empty right next to his. If the new bakery was a couple of blocks away, it would be at least fifteen minutes, maybe more, before the other man got back.
The institute might be watching him, but they had no reason to watch Jochim.
His breathing heavy, Oskar headed through the warren of eighth-floor desks. Maybe two-thirds were occupied, but no one made eye contact with him or watched what he was doing. The door to Heinrich Kessler’s office was closed, so his boss couldn’t see him. As he neared Jochim’s desk, Oskar simply sat down and sipped his coffee, as if he were right where he should be. He didn’t look around; he didn’t act suspicious.
Instead, he moved the man’s mouse to wake up the screen and noted with satisfaction that Jochim had failed to log out of his account before making his bakery run. Oskar typed quickly. He didn’t know exactly what he was looking for, but he knew where to find it. He didn’t bother attempting to access Louisa’s account directly, because he was certain the institute had already disabled it and deleted its contents both from her local computer and the main server. However, one of Oskar’s tasks in his own work was to locate and recover deleted files from targeted organizations all over the world. The institute’s security was no less vulnerable to his efforts than any other private business or government agency.
But it proved harder than he thought. Accessing the raw server data was no problem, but he knew none of the file names, and he had no idea what to search for among the millions of records. The time ticked by, and he nervously checked his watch over and over and kept glancing at the elevator doors. If they opened, if Jochim reappeared, the man would see immediately that Oskar was using his computer. There would be no way to explain it. But Oskar stayed. He had no idea when or if he’d get another chance.
Ticktock.
He imagined Jochim wandering through the institute lobby as he chewed on his piece of stollen.
Help me, Louisa, he thought. What am I looking for?
Then he remembered. The fire. Tod von Kindern. The death of children.
He narrowed his search, but even looking for references to fire and children produced an absurd number of documents. His fingers scrolled; his eyes scanned the words. Then he came upon a single sentence written by Louisa as part of a trove of travel documents filed with Heinrich Kessler for reimbursement.
The fire in Atlanta is having the desired effect.
Atlanta.
Oskar narrowed his search even further. This time he found his screen flooded with American newspaper articles. He chose one and, with another quick glance at the elevators, he began to read. As he did, the blood drained from his pale face, and he slapped a hand over his mouth, feeling a wave of nausea.
“Gott im Himmel, nein.” God in heaven, no.