The door handle shook again.
“Ha, ha. Gotta go.”
Jake swiped the door inward quickly and nearly ripped the arm off an old man who was sub five feet. The old guy looked frightened, so Jake bowed slightly and slid past the man toward his seat.
Sitting down, Jake saw that the train was starting to slow down somewhat.
“Everything all right?” Kim asked.
“Yeah. I’ll explain later. Any movement from our tails?”
“A little. When the man saw you head out, he got up and was about to follow you. He must have realized you were only going to the bathroom, so he pretended to get something from his overhead bag. What do we do?”
Jake thought about what he would have normally done in a situation like this. He might shove the guy into the bathroom and choke some information out of him. Like who in the hell hired him. But in this case, Pam Suh had just given him that information without getting any blood on his hands.
“At this time we do nothing. Ignore the both of them. Well, mostly ignore the guy. Don’t let him know you know he’s watching you. With the girl, make sure you check her out every chance you get. I have a feeling she’s the shiny object of their operation. We’re supposed to notice her.”
Kim laughed internally. “Sounds like a plan. Like I could not look at her?”
Jake leaned back against his first class seat and closed his eyes. “I’m going to catch an hour. Keep your eyes open.”
The young officer nodded his head. Jake could barely see it through a slit in his peripheral vision.
23
Jake and Kim got to Gyeongju, the ancient Korean city splattered with burial mounds of Kings, a little after noon. Kim rented a car and drove them to the resort hotel at the doorstep of Bulguksa Temple, the most important site in all of Korea.
Checking in to the hotel, Jake stared out his sixth-floor window at the plush trees and snow-covered hills that led up to the mountains to the east. He had to admit that this was a much better venue than any city in Korea. There weren’t many distractions at this time of year. The tennis courts were useless, as was the huge outdoor pool. The area would need a major warming trend to melt the snow enough for the congressional delegation to hit the links.
When he heard the door close to the room next to his, Jake smiled and knew it was time for the grand reveal.
He left his room and stood at the next door down. Then he tapped his knuckles on the wooden door and waited, trying on his best smile as an image appeared in the peep.
The door swung open and Congresswoman Lori Freeman stood with her hand on her hips. She was wearing a pair of tight jeans and a plaid western shirt, her cowboy boots pointing right at Jake.
“Are you following me?” she asked. “What happened to your hair?”
Jake looked up and down the corridor. “The video happened. May I come in?”
“How do you know I’m alone?”
He shook his head. “Because my room is next door and I only heard you come in.”
She grabbed him by the shirt and pulled him into her room. Then she locked the door behind them and turned to Jake. “Quite the spy. Nothing gets by you. Now what are you doing here?”
He couldn’t tell her the real reason. That he was trying to find a leak in the congressional delegation. Or that he was being followed by one of the most brutal intelligence officers from North Korea. No, he needed to make this more personal.
“Our government thought they could use another set of eyes on this junket,” Jake said. “I agreed to come along and keep folks honest.”
Lori sat onto her bed and pulled off her left cowboy boot. When she had a problem with the right boot, Jake helped her pull it off. Then he felt the leather on the side of the boot and saw that her initials were carved intricately into the upper section by the pull straps.
“Rattlesnake?”
“Western diamondback,” Lori corrected.
“Nice.”
“A guy in Helena made those for me. Are you going to tell me why you’re really here?” she asked, leaning back onto her elbows.
He tried to keep his eyes off of her tight jeans and even tighter shirt, but he was failing miserably. Their eyes connected and he seemed to see something he hadn’t noticed in her before. Her eyes were checking him out from top to bottom. Had he not noticed this in Montana? Or was she only now considering him?
Without saying another word, he settled onto the bed next to her and gently pulled loose hair away from her face. She grasped his biceps and he instinctively flexed for her. Then he clasped his hand behind her neck and kissed her passionately on the lips. Her chest heaved up against him and he could feel her breasts against his arm.
Breathing hard, she pulled away slightly. “I want you now,” she ordered.
That’s one order he could take from his congresswoman.
A while later, laying together in her bed naked, Jake ran his hand over the smooth skin on her back. He had to admit he had considered this scenario ever since their encounter in Montana.
She rolled over and her eyes glanced up at Jake. “Are you all right?”
Jake said nothing. He wasn’t sure how to answer her.
“I’m not looking for a relationship,” Lori said. “But I needed this.”
“I’m not a good prospect for your affection,” he said.
Lori rubbed the short hair at the base of his neck. “Why do you say that?”
“My track record,” he explained.
“Well, I haven’t been exactly stellar in the relationship arena either.”
“You’re a strong woman,” Jake reasoned. “Not a lot of men can handle that in their partners.”
“And you?”
“I don’t know. I was close to having it all not too long ago. A wife. A child. I could have retired and gone fishing.”
“I’m sorry, Jake. I read about the loss of your girlfriend during my briefing for that Berlin affair.”
His mind flashed back to Anna’s death and he tightened his jaw to fight off the pain. “Maybe I should have gone fishing instead of running down that man in Tunisia.”
“Didn’t the state department find you fishing in Patagonia before they brought you to our committee to testify?” Lori asked.
“Yeah. It’s the only pleasure I seem to find in life anymore.”
She slapped his shoulder. “Hey.”
“Until now, of course.”
“You seemed to be finding pleasure,” she said. “I found it twice.” She reached between his legs and found him hard again. “Hmm. Quite the Energizer Bunny.”
She rolled on top of him, rose up, and took him inside her in one stroke, like they had been together for years.
Back in Seoul, Pam Suh sat in her office with no windows and reviewed the security protocol for the six-party DMZ meeting set for just a few days. This would be the first time such a high-level meeting took place in her area of responsibility. As the CIA station chief for South Korea, she couldn’t let anything go wrong. Sure her counterparts from China and Japan would be there, but they would only be accompanying the U.S. ambassadors from those countries. And the Secret Service would control security of the American contingent, along with the U.S. Army. But if anything went wrong, the buck would stop at her desk.
Suddenly her phone rang, startling her. She looked and saw that the caller was Curtis Spa and Salon. Smiling at the humor of the Director of Central Intelligence, she pressed the green button and said, “I could use a massage about now. How are you, Sir?”
Hesitation on the other end. Kurt Jenkins finally said, “I take it you’ve met with Jake Adams.”
“Yes, Sir. We’ve met.”
“Is he in Gyeongju?”
“Yes. He got there hours ago with my officer, Kim Chin-Hwa. Why do you ask, Sir?” She nearly kicked herself for asking that.