Chapel tried not to grin. Good old Angel. She could make even a dry intelligence briefing sound like a naughty innuendo. He suspected she did it just to make sure he was paying attention, but he’d never complained.
“Nadia Asimova,” Angel said, “never mind the patronymic. Russian citizenship, born in Yakutia — Siberia, in other words, the exact geographic center of nowheresville. Daughter of a metallurgist and a doctor. Age thirty-one, a little on the young side for you but not ickily so.”
I’M NOT LOOKING TO DATE HER, Chapel typed.
“If men spent more time doing background checks on the women they chased,” Angel said, ignoring Chapel’s words, “they wouldn’t get in trouble so often. Anyway, it looks like she had a pretty normal childhood, except she showed an early talent for gymnastics, which is something they take very seriously in Russia. Got her name in the paper a few times for winning competitions. But she wasn’t just a jock. She did very well in school. Top of her class every year, and she even skipped two grades. At sixteen they whisked her away to the Bauman school in Moscow, which is the Russian equivalent of MIT. She started a six-year course in nuclear engineering.”
DIDN’T FINISH?
“Disappeared off the face of the earth,” Angel told him. “There are no black marks on her record — I mean, at all. Her faculty adviser was already looking to place her in a high-powered job during her second year, which means she wasn’t exactly struggling with her course load. But then the records just stop. No incomplete credits, no notice that she had dropped out, but no degree awarded, either. I think you know what that means. Somebody in the intelligence community over there took an interest and recruited her before she could finish her studies.”
FSTEK?
“Yes. FSTEK. Though I had a heck of time proving it. She isn’t on the books with any intelligence group, which is unusual even in Russia. No payroll records, no tax forms, no health insurance forms. The only mention of her anywhere since college is when she received a medal.”
A MEDAL?
“‘For Distinction in the Protection of the State Borders.’ It’s a medal usually reserved for members of the FSB — the organization formerly known as KGB — but it can be given to anyone in intelligence, or even a private citizen. There’s no indication why she got it. She’s too young for it to be a lifetime achievement award, though. She must have done something really valuable to the Fatherland. Something nobody wants to talk about, but they’re real glad it got done. There was a brief private ceremony at FSTEK headquarters in 2011 and then… she disappears again. Nothing since.”
NOTHING AT ALL?
“Not that I can find. It wasn’t easy getting what I have,” Angel said. “It’s not exactly like I can just call up the Kremlin and ask them for the personnel dossier on one of their secret agents.”
Chapel frowned to himself. You didn’t expect to turn up much on a spy — the Russian government would go to great lengths to keep Nadia’s operations secret, of course. But there should be something more if she was what she said she was — a “glorified file clerk.” The absence of evidence in this case suggested that Nadia was something like him. Invisible, and vital to Russian state security. THANKS FOR CHECKING, he typed.
“No problem, sugar. You know I’d do anything for you. I’ll be in touch,” Angel said.
“Joliñiz bolsin. Bon voyage.” It was the same flat voice from before, the voice of the language file. Chapel shut down his tablet and took the headphones off his ears.
Without the light of the screen, the dimness of the airplane cabin felt oppressive and chilly. Chapel huddled down in his seat. Then he turned and looked at Nadia where she was curled up and snoring, still.
She had pulled a blanket up over herself minutes after takeoff, but now it had slipped down off one shoulder and fallen partially to the floor. She was still dressed for July in New York, and the scarf she wore was just a thin scrap of silk. He saw her hugging herself for warmth.
He felt a sudden wave of tenderness toward this woman. She had saved his life in Miami, which was enough to make him feel something for her, but it wasn’t just that. She really was like him, wasn’t she? Sucked up into the black hole of intelligence before she even knew there were options. A brilliant childhood and then she just fell off the map. No. She’d been intentionally vanished. Taken away from her life because she was too valuable to waste on normal things like having a family, a career, a life.
He wondered if there had been someone waiting at home for her, someone who had dreaded every second she was away, not knowing if she was alive or dead. Someone who couldn’t handle it after a while and walked away from her.
Or maybe not. Maybe she’d never had anybody. Maybe there’d been no time.
Reaching over her, he lifted the blanket and pulled it back up to her chin. He’d been very careful not to touch her, but as he sat back down in his own seat he saw one of her eyes open and peer up at him. Like any good intelligence operative she had the ability to wake very quickly from sleep.
“Sorry,” he whispered. “You looked cold.”
She smiled at him and wriggled around for a second, pulling the blanket closer around herself. A moment later she was fast asleep again.
Damn.
He couldn’t believe he’d let himself get carried away like that. It had been inappropriate, for one thing, and, worse, he’d let his emotions rule him. Always a dangerous thing on an operation.
He sighed and sat back. Tried closing his eyes for a while.
It occurred him only hours later that Angel hadn’t told him the one thing he truly wanted to know — something that had nothing to do with Russian spies. She hadn’t told him whether Julia had called his phone or not.
Which meant she hadn’t.
Angel would have told him, otherwise.
Nadia’s plan was to travel to Uzbekistan, where she knew some people who could get them across the border into Kazakhstan. First, though, they had to make a quick stop in Romania to pick up the third and last member of the team.
At the customs desk in Bucharest, Chapel handed over their fake passports — the best the U.S. military could supply. He had to remove his artificial arm and let the officials x-ray it, even though it was clear they had no idea what they were looking at. A woman in a leather jacket frowned at the arm as it lay in a plastic bin, the lifeless hand dangling over the side. She pulled on latex gloves and then took out a pocket knife. Chapel protested as she extended the blade, but she said she had to stab the arm for security reasons. “What exactly would that prove?” he demanded, but that just made the woman look more stern than before.
Nadia pulled out a hundred-dollar bill and pushed it across the desk.
The customs woman put her knife away. “Welcome to Romania, Mr. Carlson,” she said, with a very warm smile.
As they walked toward the taxi rank, Chapel whispered to Nadia, “If I’d known it was that easy, I would have brought my gun, too.”
“Oh, no,” Nadia said. “There are very strict laws here about firearms. That bribe would have been ten times as much.” She pointed at the restrooms. “I need a moment,” she said. “Can you wait here with the luggage?”
Chapel nodded and sat down on a plastic bench marred by old cigarette burns. He watched the people flow by while he sat with their two small suitcases. Nadia didn’t return for ten minutes. When she did, she had completely changed.
She had ratted out her hair and put on a lot more makeup — far more than she’d worn on the party boat. She had kept her business slacks but rolled up the cuffs to show the pair of cheap sandals she’d slipped on. Her blouse was gone in favor of a halter top and a thin gold necklace with a crucifix. She looked ten years younger.