As Lyndsey heads back to her tiny office, she sees a small group gathered around a cubicle, low murmuring passed back and forth as they console someone. A young woman at the center of the group dabs her eyes with a tissue. As Lyndsey approaches, the gathered melt away. Given Lyndsey’s chumminess with Eric, they probably lump her in with management and don’t want to be seen gabbing, shirking their jobs. The teary-eyed woman looks up as Lyndsey approaches.
“I’m sorry, I don’t mean to interrupt, but were you working on Lighthouse?” Lyndsey is careful to use Kulakov’s cover name. “I’m working on the investigation—you probably heard about it. You can talk to me.”
The nameplate reads jan westerling. The woman nods as she reaches for her eyeglasses on the desk. “I’m the reports officer. I’ve been on Lighthouse’s case for a couple years.”
Exactly the person Lyndsey needs to speak to: the reports officer acts as the liaison between Langley and Moscow Station. Lyndsey rests her shoulder against a pillar, blocking the desk off from view to the rest of the office. She needs to ask a few questions and it would be better if they had even a shred of privacy. “This has got to be tough.” You’re not supposed to let yourself get too close to an asset, but you do if you’re human. Even someone like this reports officer to whom Kulakov is little more than a name in a report. Who didn’t have the kind of relationship Lyndsey had with Yaromir Popov.
The young woman nods. Still shaky, she taps a couple keys and then turns the monitor toward Lyndsey. What she sees on the screen is a punch to the gut. The image is of a man’s face, but you’ll get nothing about him from this picture. His age, his likely ethnic background, nothing. His entire face is distorted by swelling. The eyes are crusted shut with dried blood and the mouth is an open pit of glistening black, all his teeth gone. It could be a hate crime: the victim has been obliterated.
Shock washes over Lyndsey as reality hits her. This is what they’re dealing with.
“That’s from the police report,” Westerling says, her voice thickening.
Lyndsey takes a deep breath before leaning over the keyboard to page through the rest of the images. There’s one of the body on asphalt, arms and legs twisted unnaturally, like he fell from a distance. He wears a shirt and tie and a beige trench coat, the kind of clothes he’d have worn to work. “Did the report say when he was last seen?”
“He didn’t return from work one evening, about three weeks ago.”
“And who reported him missing?”
“His wife.”
Lyndsey peers at the photos more closely, looking for signs of decomposition. “Does the police report say anything about the time of death, or the state of the body?”
“They’re waiting on an autopsy for time of death, but they estimate that he’s been dead about a week.”
Which means whoever abducted him kept him alive for two weeks. Although you could make a case for torture from the state of his face, it didn’t seem likely that a bunch of homophobes would kidnap a man and hold him for two weeks if they meant to kill him.
It did sound like an interrogation, however. “Could you forward that report to me?” Lyndsey asks, getting ready to head back to her office.
As Westerling reaches for the mouse, tears spill down her cheeks. “It’s different now, you know, from when I started. They’re playing rougher in Moscow.” Tell me about it, Lyndsey wants to say, but she doesn’t want to shut the young woman down, so she nods. “It’s like the FSB feels they can take the gloves off. I can’t believe they did this to—this asset. He was a nice guy. A scientist. Harmless.” A few more tears. “He didn’t sign up for this. This should never have happened. We can’t take care of them… Something’s wrong.” She wipes at her tears, shaking her head. “Forget what I just said, I’m upset. I don’t know what I’m saying.”
Westerling meant every word and Lyndsey knows it. She’s just afraid Lyndsey will tell Eric. Lyndsey puts a hand on her shoulder. “Don’t worry about it. I know what you mean.”
The first thing Lyndsey does is forward the Russian police report to Raymond Murphy, sure that word hasn’t traveled as fast to him down in Counterintel and wanting to keep him aware of the development. Then she sends it to a woman she worked with early in her career, Ruth Mallory, someone who has followed Russian internal security services for decades. She only wants Mallory’s take on the killing; she won’t be given the background on the case, won’t betray any compartments.
Lyndsey looks up to find Maggie, the office manager, standing in the doorway to her office. She has a quizzical expression on his face, like she’s just heard bad news. She steps inside and closes the door.
“I’ve noticed you’re spending a lot of time with Theresa Warner.” There’s a warning in Maggie’s tone, if you’ve ears to hear. “That’s not a good idea.”
This is not what Lyndsey expected, not at all. “What are you talking about?”
“There are things you don’t know.” How Lyndsey hates those words: they are used too often in the intelligence business. There’s always someone happy to remind you that there’s a deeper secret you’re not privy to. After ten years, Lyndsey has learned that sometimes there’s a secret, and sometimes there isn’t.
Maggie tilts her head, weighing her words. “Theresa Warner… has a reputation. She’s rubbed some people the wrong way.”
Lyndsey parses this silently. Some people means senior managers. Rubbed them the wrong way means she’s made enemies. Committed unforgiveable offenses.
Lyndsey feels a slow burn ignite in her chest. “The woman’s husband died in a CIA operation. Of course she’s angry and upset—”
“She’s let her anger cloud her judgment. She’s alienated people, people who have tried to help her. I’m only telling you what I’ve heard.” Maggie takes a deep breath. “Be careful aligning yourself with Theresa. She’s burned too many bridges.”
How many times has Lyndsey heard these exact words whispered about a coworker? Someone could say the same thing about her. CIA can be a difficult place to work, politicized in unspoken ways. Failure isn’t viewed well, no matter whose fault it is. Some people probably distanced themselves from Theresa after Richard’s death, afraid that the taint would stick to them, too. It was a lesson she learned as a child, when some of her friends withdrew after her father’s death. They were afraid, her mother had explained. The death of a parent is scary and they’re transferring that fear to you. Her mother had always been good at seeing what was going on inside a person’s mind, and she’d taught her daughter to be the same way. It was the reason she’d decided to major in psychology. Lyndsey didn’t hold it against her young friends, but that’s when she learned not to depend on them too much. She’s surprised that she’s grown so close to Theresa. Maybe it’s because they’re so alike. Two loners.
Lyndsey looks at the office manager, reading her expression and body language. She’s sincere. She’s only trying to help. She doesn’t appear to be anyone’s cat’s-paw. Maybe there’s something to what Maggie is saying, something that bears looking into. “Okay—thanks for the warning.” For now, there’s nothing else to say.
TWELVE
Time drags in Lyndsey’s minuscule office. With no window, she judges time by the sounds outside her door. Lyndsey is about to head downstairs for another coffee, her third of the day—and stifles the urge to text Theresa to see if she wants to join her—when an email appears in her inbox.