Chapter XIII

Bonn, Germany

THE NEXT MORNING, Maddux wrote up a report on the viability of using Barcelona’s Grand Prix track for a commercial. During lunch, he made a visit to the Bonn station to find out if there had been any developments in the search for Pritchett. He decided to begin in the basement with Rose.

“Sounds like Barcelona was tougher than you anticipated,” she said the moment he walked in the door.

“All business today, I see,” Maddux countered.

“Pritchett is in trouble and needs our help. I don’t think we have the time to stand around shooting the breeze and hearing about your long strolls on the beach and around that gorgeous city.”

“You won’t be missing anything as my account would bore you to tears.”

“Then let’s discuss our most pressing matter then.”

Maddux nodded. “Has anything developed in the search for Pritchett?”

“As a matter of fact, something has. Do you remember seeing the shoe bug I was working on last year?”

He nodded. “You just needed a way to slip it into someone’s shoe without getting noticed.”

“Yes, well, that would’ve been a fool’s errand in most cases. I was having trouble setting the bug, plus we had a little issue of battery life. But I came up with a viable solution. And it was simple: recruit someone with access to Milos Marković, the head of the Yugoslavian secret police.”

“His housekeeper?”

“Bingo. She was under a tremendous amount of stress due to her husband’s large gambling debt and being the only person in her family with consistent work. I figured she might be agreeable to a deal that helped eliminate the debt and put extra change in her pocket.”

“So, what does she do?”

“We first got her to give us Marković’s shoes he wears to work every day. Every two weeks, we have her swap out the shoes with another pair that has a working battery and can transmit to one of our listening posts.”

“And one of those posts had something to report about Pritchett’s whereabouts?

She nodded. “Pritchett is being held at the Pejic House outside of Podkoren in the Upper Sava Valley, just across the border from Italy. It’s where the SDB takes prisoners for initial questioning, and the KGB utilizes the facility sometimes as well. He won’t be there longer than a couple more days, so we need to act quickly on this.”

“I’ll let Bearden know straight away,” Maddux said.

“I already told him,” she said. “And I think he’s going to send you and another agent to Podkoren to go after Pritchett. But I could be wrong. I just thought I heard him say that to someone else as I was leaving his office.”

“I’d be happy to get out of here for a few days. He was crawling all over me yesterday, quizzing me about what happened in Barcelona.”

“Did anything else happen I should know about?”

He nodded and glanced over his shoulder to make sure the room was devoid of any other tech agents who might have prying ears. Once he was satisfied that it was clean, he continued in a soft-spoken voice.

“When I was in Belgrade, I broke into the station and found a file in Kensington’s office with my father’s legend scrawled on the tab—John Hambrick. Inside, I found a photo of Kensington with my father. I also found a piece of paper with an address on it in Barcelona, so I decided to check it out when I had some time to kill.”

“It’s a good thing you didn’t get killed doing something stupid like that. You wouldn’t want to walk into an unknown situation like that without at least some intel. The man there could’ve shot you on the spot.”

“Well, I survived, but not before I met this strange man. The house might as well have been a fortress, and I would’ve had a difficult time getting in had it not been for the delivery man who was dropping off a package right around the time I arrived.”

“Did you speak to the man living there?”

Maddux nodded. “He claimed he didn’t know my father, but he seemed like he was hiding something.”

“Maybe you’re just thinking that because that’s what you want to hear.”

“I’m trying to keep an open mind about everything. However, I grew more suspicious after speaking with the deliveryman, who said he didn’t know the man’s name because the packages are always addressed to someone different. I can assure you that things don’t just seem strange because I’m wanting there to be a thread to tug on; that man was most definitely involved in some sort of nefarious activity. Whether or not he has any history with my father is unknown, but there was something going on there.”

“Well, that investigation will have to wait,” she said. “We need to get Pritchett back before it’s too late.”