NINE

Drummond immediately looked to the hallway, then out the open doors to the veranda. Court was accustomed to this. Often when he confronted someone with bodyguards, their first thought, after the stabbing pain in their heart that came with the shock, was to check and see what the hell had happened to the assholes they’d been paying to keep them safe.

Court said, “I counted three security men. Did I miss anyone?” Drummond did not respond, so he added, “I’d sure hate for somebody to come in here and surprise me while my finger’s on the trigger of the gun pointed at your face.”

“There were only three tonight,” the former NSA man said finally. “But my . . . my girlfriend is here in the house.”

“She’s fine,” Court replied, not bothering to nitpick about Drummond referring to the obvious SEBIN minder as his girlfriend. “The guards will be fine, too. Not that I think you really give a shit.”

Drummond still had not moved. He nodded, then puffed up his chest a little. “Those guards. They are Venezuelan intelligence. You fucked with the wrong people, friend.”

“That’s funny. I was about to say the same thing to you.”

Court stepped around the leather chair, then around Drummond himself, and took a seat facing the door to the hallway, directly in front of his target.

The Glock 19 with a suppressor attached rested on his thigh, the business end pointed towards Drummond, and Court’s finger hovered just outside the trigger guard.

The only light in the room save for the LEDs on the stereo was a little moonlight and a floor lamp between the chairs. Court pulled the chain on the lamp, and the room dipped into near darkness.

Now the older American looked searchingly out to the rear veranda.

Court said, “No one’s coming to save you. Sit down.”

Reluctantly, Drummond did so. Court could see worry in the man’s eyes, but he saw little of the panic that usually came with someone who thought he was about to die.

Now the NSA specialist asked again, “Who . . . are . . . you?”

“Don’t you recognize me?”

Drummond sniffed. “No. Why would I? You obviously know who I am. You should know that I don’t interface with people like you on the operational side.”

Court cocked his head at this. Operational side? The operational side of what? Court had been in the CIA’s Directorate of Operations, but Drummond would be well aware Court was no longer an Agency employee.

Court said, “I hear you were involved with hunting me down a few years back. They did, at least, show you a picture of your target, didn’t they?”

Drummond sniffed out a little laugh. “I don’t have a clue what you are talking a—”

He stopped speaking suddenly, and when he spoke again, the word came out in a gasp. “Violator?”

Court sat motionless at the mention of his CIA code name.

After several seconds Drummond said, “I don’t believe it.”

“You do,” Court countered. “I can see it in your eyes.”

Drummond sat and stared for a long time, until he finally nodded, as if reluctantly accepting the reality before him. Then he said, “Berlin sent you?”

Berlin? Court didn’t know what this meant, but he stored the information for later. When Court did not reply, Drummond sat up straighter in the chair.

“You can’t kill me.”

Court drummed his fingers across the grip of the Glock on his knee. “I disagree.”

“No . . . I mean, they still need me. Nobody else can do what I do. They want you to bring me back. They wouldn’t let you kill me if you wanted to.”

Court was confused now. “Wait. Who needs you? Berlin?”

“Berlin,” Drummond confirmed, then cocked his head. “Who else?”

“I don’t know anybody in Berlin. I was not sent by someone who needs you. I was sent by someone who needs to silence you.”

Drummond shook his head. “You’re lying. There are only two groups on Earth that have a problem with me that could be solved by a man like you. There’s Berlin . . . and there’s the CIA. And I know you aren’t CIA. As you said, they were after you, and I provided some technical assistance on the biometric and documentation side back when I was at NSA.”

Court knew his ability to scare Drummond into spilling his guts today depended on him selling the fact that he came from Langley. So, he did the one thing he rarely did in the field.

He told the truth.

“I work for DDO Hanley. Outside the lines. It’s a relationship that helps him do things that he otherwise wouldn’t be able to do on behalf of America.”

Drummond appeared poleaxed by this information. “What things?”

“Snuff out traitors, for example.”

“You’re . . . you’re a deniable asset?”

Court responded with, “I’m always deniable. I try to be an asset, when I can.”

Drummond was now, Court could tell, sufficiently terrified. In an almost reverent whisper he said, “Hanley sent the motherfucking Gray Man after me.” Still in disbelief at this fact, he said, “Matt’s always been a thorn in my side, but he’s also a friend.”

“He was a friend. Then you disappeared from NSA with state secrets. Trust me, right now, he’s pretty much just a thorn in your side.”

“So . . . what? You’re supposed to shove me into a shipping crate and haul me back to Langley?”

Court realized now was the time to push even more fear into Drummond’s mind. He shook his head. “Nope.”

“Really? Just a talking-to? Well, you can go to hell. I’m not talking.”

Court’s brown eyes darkened now. “When someone just needs a talking-to, I’m not the guy they send.”

Drummond shook his head back and forth several times at this, a show of certitude. “No. No way. Matt wouldn’t send the Gray Man to kill me.”

“I’m here to tie off a loose end. If you won’t help us understand who you peddled your wares to, then we have no choice but to minimize any further losses and to send a message to others in the intelligence community about the cost of treason.”

Drummond pulled his hands from his face, looked out the French doors to the veranda again, at the black sky.

“So . . . if I talk, if I’m transparent now, you’ll let me live?”

Court shrugged. “I have execute authority. I’ll make the call.”

“Will you get me out of Venezuela?”

“I’ll make that call, too.”

Drummond deflated fully, nestled his head back in his hands. To Court he looked like a beaten man, but Court was ready for him to try to fight, to run. He’d seen how men act in desperate times, like cockroaches caught out in the light, like wounded animals cornered.

He had to be ready for anything, but in this case, he got the outcome he’d hoped for.

“I’m trusting you, Gentry. I know you fucked over the Agency once, but if Hanley took you back, then you must have made amends. I also know you aren’t evil. You did what you were told to do, more or less, and then when you turned rogue you only went after bad actors. What I’m saying is . . . I’m expecting you to do the right thing here, and hold up your end of the bargain.”

Court simply replied, “I have a tendency to reward good behavior.”

Drummond kept his head in his hands as he said, “I was approached by a woman in D.C.”

“What woman?”

“Her name was Miriam. A pseudonym, I figured that from the beginning, but a good Jewish name. Old Testament spelling of Mary.”

“Jewish?” Court asked, surprised by this.

“She was Israeli intelligence, though she never said that outright. Not Mossad, something darker. I don’t have to tell you Jerusalem has sub rosa groups that are blacker than the Mossad.”

Drummond was right, he did not have to tell Court.

“Go on.”

“A classic bump. I should have reported it, but it was innocuous enough and it didn’t even surprise me. I had been vocal about my . . . disappointment with my superiors with regard to our intelligence sharing with Israel. Of course they were going to approach me.

“Miriam spent months selling me on the idea that Europe was going to relax economic sanctions on Iran, and that new cash flow would go into Iran’s quest for regional dominance. And she was right. Last year, EU sanctions were cut in half, and there’s pressure to lower them even more.

“And she wanted to hire me to help get the sanctions reinstated. Strengthened. I’d heard rumors at NSA that Israel was trying to get us to go along with their initiative, but official U.S. government policy was that America did not want to get pulled into any more spying in Europe that could piss off the EU, and we were holding steady with our policy on Iran.”

Gentry sat quietly for a moment, listening to the late-night calls of howler monkeys out in the trees. Finally, he spoke. “And what was Clark Drummond’s official policy?”

“There are many of us in the government who think we’ve gone weak on our enemies. We have capabilities to deal some serious intelligence blows, but certain friendly countries have been basically made off-limits. Our enemies are very active in these nations, and our efforts are hampered.”

“Like Germany?”

“Exactly like Germany. We got caught spying on the upper tiers of their government years ago. Now CIA, NSA, all the U.S. agencies, treat German soil with kid gloves. The new U.S. ambassador to Germany is openly hostile to the CIA, just like his pal the president of the United States. Meanwhile, Iran has convinced the EU to lower sanctions, and the Iranians are using that money to build nukes. Iranian spies and diplomats are running around Europe, trying to get more trade and even lower sanctions, which will mean more euros for the Shia tyrants.”

Drummond reached for his gin and tonic. Court watched the movement, ready to heft his pistol again if necessary.

The older man sipped and said, “I finally told Miriam I wanted in. She offered me one point three mil a year, but there was a caveat. I had to make a copy of PowerSlave and get it out of the U.S.”

“PowerSlave?” Court asked.

Drummond looked up at him with suspicion now. “Hanley knows I have it, which means you would know what that was if you were really sent by Hanley.”

Court didn’t miss a beat. “Hanley doesn’t tell me shit.”

Drummond eyed Court in the dim for a moment, then nodded and put his head back in his hands. “Yeah, okay. That sounds like Matt.” He continued. “PowerSlave is what I designed at Fort Meade. It’s the code name for a secret NSA program, a database-linked software application.”

“You’re boring me,” Court said.

Drummond ignored him. “The name and image of every single existing or former intelligence officer in the U.S. intelligence community. All seventeen agencies.” He looked proud suddenly. “Still bored, Gentry?”

Court wiped sweat from his forehead as he flexed his jaw muscles in anger. “You gave Israel our NOC list?”

“PowerSlave is not just NOCs. It’s all intelligence agency employees, either official or nonofficial cover. And it’s not just the list, either. It’s all their biometric data, as well. I added the complete database into a program you can run against facial recog data; any camera you can hack into, you can use. If an American spook passes a camera I have access to, it will trigger an alert to PowerSlave.

“It uses biometric algorithms to query the face in front of the camera with the database, then uses high-level machine learning to run data against known actors. It accounts for plastic surgery, disguises, everything. It can’t be spoofed.”

Court nodded. “And that’s how you rolled up Hightower.”

He nodded.

“I wormed into all the cameras around here; Zack didn’t stand a chance.” Drummond added, “I know Hightower was your team leader back with Golf Sierra. What was it they used to call you guys? The Gangster Squad?”

“The Goon Squad.”

“Right,” Drummond said.

Court was thinking about what a dick Hanley was to send Zack up against a guy in possession of the means to identify him via biometric data. He cleared his head of his anger. “Back to Miriam. She wanted you to fake your death?”

“She helped me stage the accident in the Chesapeake. I was on a private jet to Germany that afternoon. She put me up in a farmhouse in Potsdam, guarded twenty-four-seven by armed Israelis. She gave me a team of tech experts, all private sector men and women: a Brit, a couple of Germans, an Israeli, and a woman from Lithuania.”

“What was Miriam’s objective?”

“At first, she wanted PowerSlave to help them ID U.S. intelligence personnel from Berlin station. America had been pushing back against Israeli covert ops, thinking that for some reason Israel was trying to goad Iran into attacking the West. But my work with Israel wasn’t about war, it was about sanctions, so I was totally on board with helping Israel combat the Americans on that. Everyone on my team was.”

Court looked at his watch, mindful of how long the men and the woman around the house would remain under the effects of the propofol. He said, “You seem pretty proud of yourself for the work you were doing over there. That raises the question . . . Why are you here?”

There was new stress in his voice. “Because people started dying.”

Court cocked his head. “In Iran?”

Now Drummond shouted, the stress overtaking him fully. “No! On the fucking streets of Berlin!”