So, too, did the newest addition to this illustrious band of operatives: Olga Sukhova. They knew her by name and reputation, of course, but none had ever actually met the famed Russian journalist. Gabriel saw to the introductions with a studied evasive-ness only a veteran of the secret world could summon. He provided Olga with first names but made no mention of current positions or past professional exploits. As far as Gabriel was concerned, the six individuals were blank slates, tools that had been lent to him by a higher power.
They approached her in pairs and carefully shook her hand. The women, Rimona and Dina, came first. Rimona was in her mid-thirties and had shoulder-length hair the color of Jerusalem limestone. A major in the IDF, she had worked for several years as an analyst for AMAN before transferring to the Office, where she was now part of a special Iran task force. Dina, petite and dark-haired, was an Office terrorism specialist who had personally experienced its horrors. In October 1994 she was standing in Tel Aviv’s Dizengoff Square when a Hamas terrorist detonated his suicide belt aboard a No. 5 bus. Twenty-one people were murdered that day, including Dina’s mother and two of her sisters. Dina herself had suffered a serious leg wound and still walked with a slight limp.
Next came a pair of men in their forties, Yossi and Yaakov. Tall and balding, Yossi was currently assigned to the Russia Desk of Research, which is how the Office referred to its analytical division. He had read classics at All Souls College at Oxford and spoke with a pronounced English accent. Yaakov, a compact man with black hair and a pockmarked face, looked as if he couldn’t be bothered with books and learning. For many years he had served in the Arab Affairs Department of Shin Bet, Israel’s internal security service, recruiting spies and informants in the West Bank and Gaza. Like Rimona, he had recently transferred to the Office and was currently running agents into Lebanon.
Next came an oddly mismatched pair who shared one common attribute. Both spoke fluent Russian. The first was Eli Lavon. An elfin figure with wispy gray hair and intelligent brown eyes, Lavon was regarded as the finest street surveillance artist the Office had ever produced. He had worked side by side with Gabriel through countless operations and was the closest thing Gabriel had to a brother. Like Gabriel, Lavon’s ties to the Office were somewhat tenuous. A professor of biblical archaeology at Jerusalem’s Hebrew University, he could usually be found waist-deep in an excavation trench, sifting through the dust and artifacts of Israel’s ancient past. Twice each year, he lectured on surveillance techniques at the Academy, and he was forever being drawn out of retirement by Gabriel, who was never truly comfortable in the field without the legendary Eli Lavon watching his back.
The figure standing at Lavon’s side had eyes the color of glacial ice and a fine-boned, bloodless face. Born in Moscow to a pair of dissident Jewish scientists, Mikhail Abramov had come to Israel as a teenager within weeks of the Soviet Union’s collapse. Once described by Shamron as “Gabriel without a conscience,” he had joined the Office after serving in the Sayeret Matkal special forces, where he had assassinated several of the top terrorist masterminds of Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad. His talents were not limited to the gun; the previous summer, in Saint-Tropez, he had infiltrated Ivan Kharkov’s entourage, along with a CIA officer named Sarah Bancroft. Of all those gathered at the villa by the lake, only Mikhail had had the distinct displeasure of actually sharing a meal with Ivan. Afterward, he admitted it was the most terrifying experience of his professional life-this coming from a man who had hunted terrorists across the badlands of the Occupied Territories.
Within the corridors and conference rooms of King Saul Boulevard, these six men and women were known by the code name “Barak”-the Hebrew word for lightning-because of their ability to gather and strike quickly. They had operated together, often under conditions of unbearable stress, on secret battlefields stretching from Moscow to Marseilles to the exclusive Caribbean island of Saint-Barthélemy. Usually, they conducted themselves in a highly professional manner and with few intrusions of egotism or pettiness. Occasionally, a seemingly trivial issue, such as assigning bedrooms, could provoke outbursts of childishness and flashes of ill temper. Unable to resolve the dispute themselves, they turned to Gabriel, the wise ruler, who imposed a settlement by decree and somehow managed to satisfy no one, which, in the end, they regarded as just.
After establishing a secure communications link with King Saul Boulevard, they convened for a working dinner. They ate like a family reunited, which in many respects they were, though their conversation was more circumspect than usual, owing to the presence of an outsider. Gabriel could tell by the inquisitive looks on their faces that they had heard rumors in Tel Aviv. Rumors that Amos was yesterday’s man. Rumors that Gabriel would soon be taking his rightful place in the director’s suite at King Saul Boulevard. Only Rimona, Shamron’s niece by marriage, dared to ask whether it was true. She did so in a whisper and in Hebrew, so that Olga could not understand. When Gabriel pretended not to hear, she gave him a covert kick in the ankle, a retaliatory strike only a relative of Shamron would dare undertake.
They adjourned to the great room after dinner and there, standing before a crackling fire, Gabriel conducted the first formal briefing of the operation. Grigori Bulganov, the Russian defector who had twice saved Gabriel’s life, had been abducted by Ivan Kharkov and brought to Russia, where in all likelihood he was undergoing a severe interrogation that would end with his execution. They were going to get him back, Gabriel said, and they were going to put Ivan’s operatives out of business. And their quest would begin with an extraction and interrogation of their own.
In another country, in another intelligence service, such a proposal might have been greeted with expressions of incredulity or even mockery. But not the Office. The Office had a word for such unconventional thinking: meshuggah, Hebrew for crazy or foolish. Inside the Office, no idea was too meshuggah. Sometimes, the more meshuggah, the better. It was a state of mind. It was what made the Office great.
There was something else that set them apart from other services: the freedom felt by lower-ranking officers to make suggestions and even to challenge the assumptions of their superiors. Gabriel took no offense when his team embarked on a rigorous deconstruction of the plan. Though they were an eclectic mix-indeed, most were never meant to be field agents at all-they had carried out some of the most daring and dangerous operations in Office history. They had killed and kidnapped, committed acts of fraud, theft, and forgery. They were Gabriel’s second eyes. Gabriel’s safety net.
The discussion lasted another hour. Most of it was conducted in English for Olga’s benefit, but occasionally they lapsed into Hebrew for reasons of security or because no other language would do. There were occasional flashes of temper or the odd insult, but for the most part the tone remained civil. When the last issue had been resolved, Gabriel brought the session to a close and broke the team into working groups. Yaakov and Yossi would acquire the vehicles and secure the routes. Dina, Rimona, and Chiara would prepare the cover organization and create all necessary websites, brochures, and invitations. The Russian speakers, Mikhail and Eli Lavon, would handle the interrogation itself, with Olga serving as their consultant. Gabriel had no specific task, other than to supervise and to worry. It was fitting, he thought, for it was a role Shamron had played many times before.