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“You ready to roll?”

Washburn shook his head. “I can’t believe I am doing this for you.”

“’Cause I’m one of the good guys, remember?”

“Better not forget those shoes.”

“Size seven.”

Washburn slipped his gun free and put it on the center console. “You going to recognize him?”

“You think there are other guys like him in there?”

“Wouldn’t doubt it, all the boys that got hurt over there.”

“Amen,” said Grillo. “Let’s roll.”

Washburn put the car into gear and slowly cruised down the block. It was 10 p.m. and the sky was black with clouds, the air buzzing as it does before a storm. A few people walked along the sidewalk, heading toward Times Square.

“Hey, man,” said Grillo. “Whichever way it goes, thanks.”

A fist bump between friends.

It had required all the pieces of the puzzle to locate Palantir. The agenda, the credit card bills, the phone records, and finally the Skype address that had tied it all together. It was not, as it turned out, the first time the NSA had seen Cassandra99.ru. The same address had turned up in a search a few years earlier in a request from DARPA asking to investigate a cyberattack against its server. At that time two phone numbers were associated with a credit card used to pay for the Skype account. One of the numbers matched a phone Palantir had used to contact Edward Astor. By means of triangulation, the NSA had narrowed down Cassandra99’s location to one of two areas. Using Edward Astor’s credit card receipts from last Friday morning, when he had ventured to midtown to meet Palantir, Grillo was able to offer an educated guess as to which location was more likely to be Palantir’s home. The triangulation was accurate to 10 feet as far as latitude and longitude were concerned. It did not, however, offer much help in terms of altitude. Number 3415 was a three-story tenement. It required a human’s gumshoeing to find out who lived inside the building. In this case, Grillo had slipped the postman a twenty to let him look at the names of all those receiving mail at the address. Paul Lawrence Tiernan fit the bill. The military records Grillo obtained afterward confirmed that he had his man, as well as the probable reasons for Palantir’s grudge against the United States government.

Washburn stopped the car in front of the scruffy building. Grillo climbed out and jogged across the street, checking that the tail of his shirt was loose and covering his pistol, a slim Smith & Wesson with a nine-shot clip. The front hall was clogged with bicycles chained to a radiator, bags of trash, and empty beer cans. Salsa music drifted from an open door upstairs. Tiernan’s apartment was at the back of the first floor. Grillo knocked twice and stepped back. He noted that there were two spyglasses built into the door, one at eye level, the other at his waist. He knocked again and the door opened.

Mike Grillo looked at the legless man in the wheelchair. “Gotcha.”

“Good guy or bad guy?”

“You’re still breathing, aren’t you?”

“You win.” Paul Lawrence Tiernan rolled his chair back to allow Grillo to enter. “Name?”

“Grillo, Michael T. That would be Captain to you. Fifth Marines. Seventh Battalion.”

“Semper fi,” said Tiernan without conviction. He was a handsome man with short black hair parted neatly, blue eyes, and a reliable set to his jaw. “You a fed these days? DOD? FBI? What?”

“Strictly private sector. I work for Bobby Astor.”

“Do I need to be scared?”

“Not if you help me out.”

Tiernan motioned for Grillo to come in. “It was the Skype, wasn’t it?”

“And some other stuff. Hard to stay hidden when so many people are looking for you.”

In contrast to the ramshackle foyer, Tiernan’s apartment was spotless, if sparsely furnished to provide ample space to move about. A bookshelf held pictures of Tiernan during his time as a United States Marine. He’d served for ten years and been in line for a second rocker when he was hit.

“I was over there, too,” said Grillo. “Helmand. Kandahar. I was lucky.”

“I wasn’t.”

“You’ve got a right to be bitter. You don’t have a right to hide information that weighs on the security of the country.”

“I’m not hiding anything,” said Tiernan. “I offered it to the Agency. They didn’t want to pay. They said I owed it to the country to tell them. Edward Astor forked over fifty grand without batting an eye. Now I have a rail in my bathroom so I can use the head easier. Next week they’re coming to install a bigger shower so I can roll all the way in. There might even be enough cash left to buy me a van I can drive myself.”

“I’m glad for you. I’m going to need a copy of the report you prepared for Astor-whatever it was you gave him last Friday morning. Where’d you meet him? Starbucks on 42nd and Broadway?”

“You’re good.”

Grillo shrugged. “The thing about being on my side of things, I don’t have to worry about breaking laws. You’re lucky I got here first. Penelope Evans wasn’t.”

“I saw that.”

“So who’s after you?”

“A big shot in the Chinese government named Magnus Lee. Runs some kind of gigantic investment fund. He uses his fund to buy into companies that manufacture or control critical infrastructure in the U.S. and Europe, South America. We’re talking microchips, satellites, power plants, that kind of thing. Afterward, he puts his people into key positions in those companies, where they can install software to give him control of it.”

“That’s what got Edward Astor so worked up?”

“Only half of it. Lee is planning to sabotage a critical financial system in the States. He’s using the attack to advance his chances to get elected to the Standing Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. He wants to be a vice premier.”

“What financial system are you talking about?”

“That I don’t know. But something that requires a new hardware complex. It’s all in the report. Wait here.” Tiernan spun a one-eighty in his chair and rolled down a hallway. He returned with a folder on his lap. “Have at it.”

Grillo picked up the slim folder. The summary alone made for scary reading. “Edward Astor owe you any more money?”

“We’re square.”

“If things go south, there’re going to be some people want to speak with you.”

“Maybe they’ll offer me a job.”

Grillo shook his head. It was amazing how smart people could be so dumb. “If they do, it’ll be one you can do from a prison cell.”

80

Pain, the purifier.

Astor had lost the first fingernail an hour before. He did not know how he was still conscious, or why he was actually alert and seated in the chair, his eyes locked on the sadistic blue-eyed monk’s. The index finger was ruined. So was the middle finger. They hung limp, as bloody and lifeless as John Sullivan.

Astor watched as the monk’s hand darted forward, as fast as a cobra’s tongue, and the bamboo shoot disappeared into his nail bed. He winced but made no noise. He was done with that. He had already cried for them to stop. He had begged. He’d pleaded to be shot. He’d surrendered his dignity and more.

It was only then that Reventlow had begun his questions.

“How long had you been working with your father? How did you learn about Penelope Evans? Tell me everything you found in her home. What did you tell your ex-wife?” And finally, “Who is Palantir?”

Astor told the truth. He knew nothing more than they did. If anything, he talked too much. He provided Reventlow with more information than he needed. He offered his own theories about Magnus Lee’s plans. He adopted the strategy to lengthen the periods between his torture. A second of respite was worth infinite cunning. But quickly he discovered that his fevered guesses provoked telling responses about the plot, and that by process of elimination he was closing in on what the target really was.