The assassin’s arm shot forward, a stiletto in his hand. Jonathan dodged right, shoving the man viciously to one side. A knife. But of course, he thought. No one could penetrate security with a gun. The assassin slammed into the wall and fell to a knee.
Jonathan knew better than to fight. He’d tried his luck twice in the past days, and both times he’d come away injured. In his view, he had two strikes against him.
He ran.
He crossed the length of the livestock hut, cutting between the hut and the barn next to it. Soon he was back on a paved road, running for all he was worth. After one hundred meters, he came to a fork in the road. He chose to go in the direction that climbed the hill. Ahead, he could see cars and pedestrians crowding the Davosstrasse. He looked over his shoulder. The street was empty. The killer had vanished. Jonathan stopped running and settled into a walk.
Two police cars were parked at the end of the block. Beyond them rose a security fence topped with razor wire. It was a checkpoint governing access from the green zone to the red zone.
Jonathan slipped behind the garage of a beverage distribution company. Kegs of beer were stacked four high, row upon row. He ducked inside the maze of crates and barrels, snaking this way and that, until he reached a dead end. With nowhere to go, he freed a crate and sat down. For the moment, he was safe.
He pulled his coat around him and ran through his options. The list was depressingly short. He could no longer wait until dark. If the assassin had found him once, he’d find him again. Hiding was not an option. Bathed in shade, he began to shiver.
If only he could wait until dark…until the speeches…
Paul Noiret was scheduled to give his talk about Third World corruption this evening. If Paul was here, so was Simone.
Jolted out of his funk, he pulled out Blitz’s phone and dialed.
“Allô.”
“Simone,” he said breathlessly. “It’s Jonathan.”
“My God, where are you?”
“I’m in Davos. I’ve gotten myself in trouble. Where are you?”
“I’m here, too, of course. With Paul. Are you safe?”
“For now. But I need to get out of here.”
“Why? What’s happened? You sound frightened.”
“Do you see that plume of smoke not far from the Belvedere?”
“It’s directly across the street from my hotel. Did you hear the explosion? Paul and I think it was a bomb. He won’t let me leave the room.”
“It might have been one.”
Thinking back on the explosion, he realized that there was no reason for the gas tank to have ignited, and that the blast was several times bigger than what could have been fueled by a half tank of gasoline. Its force reminded him of an artillery burst. The car had been rigged to go off. He didn’t know how it was set off, or why the police at the checkpoint hadn’t detected the explosives. All he knew was that the explosion had blown an armored car’s engine block off its mounts and left the hood bent like a ruined pup tent.
“You mean you know something about it?” Simone asked.
“I was in the car thirty seconds before it went up. Look, Simone, I need your help. Did Paul bring his car?”
“Yes, but-”
“Just listen. If you can’t go through with what I’m asking, I’ll understand.” Jonathan forced himself to speak slowly. “I need you to get me out of town. I need a ride to Zurich. If you leave now, you can be back in time for Paul’s speech.”
“What would I tell him?”
“Tell him the truth.”
“But I don’t know what the truth is.”
“I’ll tell you everything in the car.”
“Jon, you’re putting me in a difficult spot. I told you to leave the country.”
“I’ll leave as soon as I get to the U.S. consulate.”
“The U.S. consulate? But why? They’ll only turn you over to the Swiss police.”
“Maybe. Maybe not. I’ve got something that may buy me some time.”
“What is it? Did you finally get your proof?”
“It doesn’t matter,” he snapped, losing his patience. “Will you do it?”
“I can’t tell Paul. He won’t allow it.”
“Where is he now?”
“With his colleagues, preparing for his talk.”
“Do this for Emma.”
“Where are you?”
“Drive down Davosstrasse until you pass the tourist office. Turn left and go to the bottom of the hill. You’ll see an old barn down the road to your left with a trough out front and a rusty tractor sitting out back. I’ll be waiting there.”
Simone hesitated. “Alright, then. Give me five minutes.”
A silver Renault pulled up next to the barn on schedule. Simone rolled down her window. “Jonathan,” she called. “Are you there?”
Jonathan waited for a few seconds, his eyes on the road behind her, waiting to see if she’d been followed. When no cars approached, he waited longer still. He was certain that the assassin was out there.
Finally, he ducked from behind the shed on the opposite side of the street and dashed to the car. “Open the trunk,” he said, wrapping his knuckles against the passenger window.
Simone jumped in her seat.
“Hurry up,” he said. “Someone’s following me.”
“Who is it? Where? Do you see them?”
“I don’t know exactly, but he’s close.”
“They’re saying an Iranian minister was inside the car when it exploded. Parvez Jinn. He was set to give the keynote address tonight.”
Jonathan nodded. “The trunk,” he said.
“Tell me what I’m getting myself into.”
“I was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Come on. Hurry!”
Simone considered this, then motioned for him to get in. A moment later, she released the trunk.
“Stop in Landquart and let me out,” he said. “I’ll explain everything to you then.”
With that, he hustled to the rear of the car, arranged himself inside the trunk, and pulled it closed.
71
“I have him,” Simone Noiret said quietly into her cell phone. “I’ll pick you up where we agreed.”
She hung up, then lowered the car radio’s volume. “How are you doing back there?” she called over her shoulder. “Can you hear me?”
A muffled voice and two thumps was her response. The trunk might be cramped, but there was more than enough oxygen for the short ride. After all, she was not planning on transporting Jonathan to Zurich.
For over two years, Simone Noiret had been working to infiltrate Division. It was odd to think of turning against your own country, but the world was a decidedly odd place these days. Rivalries were as fierce between organizations as between enemy nations.
Born Fatima Françoise Nasser in Queens, New York, she was the daughter of a French-Algerian mother and an Egyptian father. Her earliest memories were of money, or more precisely, arguments about the lack of it. Her father was a congenital miser. When she thought of the cunning it had taken to wrest a lousy ten dollars from his tight fist, it made her sweat. She joined the army at eighteen because her brother had done so before her. Her language skills placed her in Intelligence. Besides French, Arabic, and English, she spoke Farsi. She was trained at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, and the Army Defense Language Institute in Monterrey before being stationed in Germany. She rose to E-5 before she got out. With the money she’d saved and the army helping to foot tuition, she attended Princeton University, graduating summa cum laude with a degree in Middle Eastern Studies.
Hardly a month later, she received a call asking her to come to a meeting in Manhattan with a representative of the CIA. He made his pitch straightaway. The operations directorate had been keeping an eye on her dating back to her time in the army. They offered her a slot overseas. It was spying pure and simple. Not like you saw in the movies, but the real thing. She would attend a course at the Farm, the CIA’s training facility, near Williamsburg, Virginia. If she passed, she would go on for further training as a clandestine operative. He needed an answer in twenty-four hours. Simone said yes on the spot.