FORTY
Court made it to Dr. Kaya’s flat just after eleven, and he rang her call button, then waited for her to buzz him in. After a minute he buzzed again, but she appeared in the darkened lobby and unlocked the door herself. As soon as she saw him, she took him by the arm without speaking. There were other residents returning home at the same time, but she put him in an empty elevator and stepped in behind him before anyone saw him.
When they began their ascent, she said, “I won’t ask you what happened to your forehead. That, I can treat with ice. But you have a fever, a bad one, I can tell by looking at you.”
With discomfort in his voice, he said, “I can tell by being me.”
“As soon as we get into my flat, I want you to lie on the settee.”
“What’s a settee?”
“It’s the couch you used three years ago.”
“Right.”
“I’m going to give you a course of IV antibiotics and some pain meds. I also have something for energy, but you’ll want to wait till morning to take—”
“First I need a place to make a phone call. In private.”
“Look at you, you’re about to pass out.”
“I already did pass out, so I guess I’m well rested.”
She looked at him like he was insane. “You’re anything but well—”
“It’s a joke. Please, a five-minute phone call and then I’m all yours.”
When they got off on her floor she led him up a flight of wooden stairs, and then onto the roof of the building. There were a few plants and chairs there for the residents, but this late at night, it was empty and quiet.
The young woman left him alone, and he called Brewer using his Signal encryption app.
She answered, he gave her his ID credentials, and then he said, “Zoya and Ennis had a two-man team on them tonight. She went to her room, so I followed one of the men when he started a tail on Ennis. He made me, we got into it, and I—”
“Were you two blocks away from the Adlon?”
Court replied, “Yeah, more or less. Anyway, I—”
“You killed him,” Brewer said.
“No, I didn’t kill him. I rang his bell, busted his nose, maybe, but he’ll be fine. He could have been Russian, but he also could have been—”
Brewer interrupted. “Less than ninety minutes ago, two blocks away from the Adlon Kempinski, a man was killed. He was an officer in the BfV. Are you going to tell me you didn’t do it?”
“BfV?” Shit. He thought back to his encounter outside the Hilton. After a moment, he said, “There was a gunshot. The man I fought had a partner. He couldn’t raise him. Somebody must have—”
“Somebody? Even if it wasn’t you, if you got your face on any cameras in the area, it’s not going to look good.”
“Maybe they were going after Anthem,” Court said. “Has she checked in?”
Brewer did not hesitate an instant. “I just spoke with her. She’s fine. She heard the gunshot, too, but says she was in her suite with the door locked when it happened.”
Thank God, Court thought.
Now Brewer said, “Listen very carefully, Violator. Security is going to be even tighter around Anthem’s hotel. Around the embassy, too.”
“Because the murder happened near the U.S. embassy?”
“That, and . . . and other reasons.”
Court understood. “Yeah, the thing Hanley keeps hinting at. Are we nuking Iran or something?” It was a joke, generated by a brain that was barely conscious and told by a man who wasn’t in a good mood.
But Brewer didn’t seem to take it as a joke at all. “Something,” she said.
“Seriously?”
“I want you to cease your surveillance of Anthem and find Annika Dittenhofer,” Brewer said next.
“Anthem is the only reason I’m here.”
“Anthem is safe. She’ll be in her hotel tomorrow, not in the field.”
“All right,” he said. “If you can assure me Anthem is secure, that the Russians don’t know about her being in Berlin, and that she’s going to remain in place for the next day, I’ll go after Dittenhofer.”
“I can assure you of all these things. Get back to work.”
Court hung up, slipped his phone into a pocket, and sat there in the warm evening. He had not told Brewer the complete truth, and he imagined she hadn’t told him the complete truth, either. He would comply with her request that he find Annika Dittenhofer—eventually. But the right play for him, right now, was to somehow make contact with Zoya. They could work this together, he just had to find a way to do it where he didn’t blow her cover.
He shook his head to wake himself fully, then stood up on shaky legs. First things first, he told himself. He headed downstairs to Dr. Kaya’s apartment, steadying himself on the stairs as he descended by dragging a shoulder along the wall.
Suzanne Brewer hung up the phone in her office on the sixth floor of the McLean, Virginia, headquarters of the CIA, then looked up and across her desk to Matthew Hanley. Usually the DDO had loosened his tie and removed his jacket by now; it was after five p.m., after all. But though he was neither a slave to protocol nor to fashion, at the moment he wore his best suit, his crispest white shirt, and a muted blue necktie secured under his collar in a full Windsor.
Brewer was subordinate to the DDO, but she was supremely sure of herself. The DDO, on the other hand, wore his conflicting thoughts on his face. “We said we’d pull Anthem if the Russians found her. She just called you and told you the Russians found her.”
Brewer did not hesitate in her reply. “It’s too early to pull her. When she called a half hour ago, I told her as much.”
“I agree, unfortunately.” Then Hanley asked, “Where the hell was Violator tonight? He was supposed to be watching Anthem’s ass.”
Brewer said, “He was off scene, tailing someone else. He doesn’t know anything about what happened to Anthem.”
Hanley said, “It was the right call, unfortunately, not telling Court about Anthem’s encounter with the Russian tonight. How is Zoya now?”
Brewer nodded. “I told her we’d put Berlin station on her to watch her back. That settled her down a little.”
Hanley sighed. “Yeah, well, we can’t do that, can we?”
“Of course not. Berlin station would be uncovered via PowerSlave, and that would compromise Anthem. Plus, we do not want to get into a war with Russian intelligence, even if this bunch after her are mafia hitters working in the interests of Moscow but not under their direct employ. This shooting tonight is going to make everything harder, I suppose, but it doesn’t change our critical need for intel.”
Hanley looked at his watch, then pulled himself up to his feet. “Well, I’ve got to get to the White House. I will be there the rest of the night.” He paused. “Listen. I need everything I can get from both of the Poison Apple assets. By tomorrow morning I expect we are going to be dealing with a ticking clock.”
“You still can’t tell me what’s about to happen tonight?”
He shook his head, then shrugged a little. “I can tell you that what we are about to do is as righteous as anything we’ve ever done, but it sure as hell is not about making this shitty world a safer place.”
Hanley grabbed his briefcase and headed for the door.
When she was alone, Suzanne Brewer took a few calming breaths, and she thought about everything that was going on in Berlin. The Iranians were her enemy, of course, but as far as she was concerned, so were Anthem and Violator. Working with them in the Poison Apple program had unquestionably stunted her career, and she wanted nothing more in this world than to be away from Matt Hanley, away from Zoya Zakharova and Zack Hightower, and far, far away from Court Gentry. It was the only way forward for her, but for now, she knew she had to be the good soldier and do her job.
Court lay on the sofa in Dr. Azra Kaya’s small but comfortable flat, with an IV stuck in his left arm and a bag of antibiotics and saline hanging from a floor lamp next to him, dripping slowly but steadily through the line and into his bloodstream. He wore an ice pack on his forehead, and his pistol was hidden from the civilian in the small of his back under him.
The infusion of antibiotics did nothing to make Court feel better; that would happen only after weeks of regular doses. But the other things she had given him—anti-inflammatories, narcotic painkillers, B vitamins, and bottled water with electrolytes for hydration—were taking the edge off his aches, pains, and general malaise.
Azra Kaya had taken it upon herself to feed the injured operator, as well. While the IV emptied slowly into his arm, Azra made a simple dinner of pork cutlet and mashed potatoes with sauerkraut, and Court wolfed down his portion while she sat nearby at the table and ate.
He washed down a swallow of food with fortified water, but before taking his next bite, he said, “Something bad happened tonight, not far from here. It will be on the news. I want you to know, I had absolutely nothing to do with it.” He motioned to his forehead. “This is not from that.”
In truth, he had had something to do with the killing of the BfV man tonight. He hadn’t shot the man he had been pitted against, but the man killed might have had a partner there to back him up if Court hadn’t taken the other man’s attention.
He didn’t know, but he also didn’t feel terrific about knocking the shit out of a German intelligence officer who had just been doing his job.
“What happened?” Kaya asked.
“A man was killed. A German government employee.”
She put her fork down and turned to him. “If you didn’t have anything to do with it, then why are you telling me?”
Court swigged more water, then shrugged. “I don’t really have an answer. I guess I want you to know I’m not the kind of person who would do that.”
But was he? he questioned.
Azra said, “My oath is to treat my patients to the best of my ability. I am doing that with you. I don’t know who you are, or what you have or have not done. I can’t even let myself care.”
Court sensed that she did care. But he said, “Okay, that’s fair. But I’m here for good, not bad.”
The doctor stood up from her empty plate, lifted the frosty bag off Court’s forehead, and looked at the bruise there. He could see his reflection in a mirror behind the sofa. Though the ice was doing its job keeping the swelling to a minimum, it was still purple and slightly raised.
Dr. Kaya said, “I get the strong impression that someone didn’t feel the same way.”
Court smiled. “Clearly he did not.” He looked up at her. “I don’t get it.”
She replaced the ice. “Get what?”
“Why do you do this? Why do you let fucked-up strangers in your house like this? I realize you are getting paid, but you don’t seem the type.”
“You don’t seem fucked up.”
“Oh, I guarantee you, I am.”
She smiled at this, thought over his question for a moment. Finally she said, “Three years ago, when I was new at the hospital, a fourth-year med student and an old family friend, also a doctor from Turkey, took me aside and asked if I wanted some help paying off my school loan, to earn some extra money. He was retiring and moving back to Ankara. He introduced me to a Frenchman who said he would pay me a small retainer every month to be ready at any moment to treat patients outside the hospital system.
“I was scared, at first. But I needed the money, and I worried about what care these people would receive if they could go to no doctor at all. Plus, it’s not illegal to give medical care to a criminal. So, I said yes.
“The Frenchman told me I might not hear from him for years, but just a month or so later, a call came late at night. A man was on his way to see me, and I needed to be prepared to treat a traumatic injury.
“I was off work that night and was afraid to try to sneak a wounded man into the hospital, but my apartment was quiet, and I could get whatever I needed from a minor care clinic nearby, where I worked on one of my rotations. So I sat here, and waited.”
Court jumped in. “And I showed up.”
She went back to her chair at the table and sat down. “I felt good about what I did because I could tell you were a nice man. That, and the money, ensured I would continue working for the Frenchman. It’s been over three years now.” Her face grew darker, and she let out a sad little sigh. “I’ve yet to meet another nice man doing this.”
“I’m sorry.”
Dr. Kaya shrugged. “I don’t know who the people who are sent to me are, where they come from. What they have done. But there have been eight so far, all badly injured. One did not survive.” She seemed pained by this. “I believe in the work. Everyone deserves a chance at life, and I can give them that chance. But the other men . . . have been more difficult.” She looked up at him now. “Why were you different?” she asked.
He said, “That night. I’m used to stuff like that. But it was a tough time for you, I could see that. I felt bad.” After a moment he added, “I was lonely. It’s part of the job, but when you do meet someone outside of the work, it reminds you what normal people are like. You were normal.”
“Are you still lonely?”
Court hesitated. “Sometimes.” Then he added, “But that’s not why I’m here.”
She laughed nervously as she stood from her table again. “Yes, of course it’s not.” She came over and checked the IV bag.
The pain meds were kicking in, and he was fed and comfortable. He felt reenergized. He still needed sleep, or at least he needed the Adderall she’d given him to keep going, but he wouldn’t take the pills yet, and he wouldn’t sleep until he got back to his little flat in Spandau.
More than anything, though, he wanted to talk to Zoya. He knew what Hanley and Brewer thought of the matter. That it would be too dangerous for him to make direct contact with her. But he told himself there had to be a way, because Zoya was in too much danger now to keep going forward under cover.
German intelligence officers were definitely following her, and he thought it likely Russian assassins would soon arrive to kill her. And he had been compromised to some sort of paramilitary unit that was trying to kill him.
He needed to speak to Zoya, to convince her to get out of town before it was too late.
Dr. Kaya stepped back over and gently pulled the IV out of his arm, bringing him back to the moment.
He climbed to his feet and immediately realized he’d recovered a lot of his strength in the past hour. “I really appreciate it.”
“You might feel a little euphoric, revitalized. But remember, you need to take it easy.”
“Nobody sends me anywhere for easy.” He pulled a wad of euros from his pocket. “Here’s five thousand. Is that enough?”
She took the money. “That’s plenty. For the week, two if you are around. Reach out whenever you need me.”
She reached down and picked up a paper bag from the table. “Everything you need is in here. Use the Adderall sparingly. Twenty milligrams maximum at any one time, no more than twice a day. Remember, it’s to keep you awake and alert, it’s not to turn you into Superman.”
“You got it.”
He left Dr. Kaya’s building just after midnight, climbed into a taxi nearby, and headed back to Spandau. He would walk the street for a while and then return to his spartan little flat. He had work to do still, and then he’d get a couple hours’ sleep. Tomorrow, he told himself, he would execute his quickly forming plan to make contact with Zoya.