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“Everyone knew, Soraya, except you.”
“Good Lord.” She jumped up and began to stalk around the room, ru
“Okay, putting aside the fact that you need a job, step back and think for a minute. When Willard makes good on his promise, when Halliday is gone, how long d’you think Danziger will last at CI?” He stood up. “I don’t know about you, but I want the old CI back, the one the Old Man ran for decades, the one I can be proud of.”
“You mean the one that used Jason over and over again whenever it suited its purpose.”
He laughed, deflecting her blade of cynicism. “Isn’t that one of the things intelligence organizations do best?” He came toward her. “Come on, tell me that you don’t want the old CI back.”
“I want to be ru
“Yeah, well, you don’t want to know how Danziger’s going to fuck up the Typhon networks you built up.”
“To tell you the truth, Typhon’s future is all I’ve been thinking about since I walked out of HQ this afternoon.”
“Then join me.”
“What if Willard fails?”
“He won’t,” Marks said.
“Nothing in life is assured, Peter, you of all people should know that.”
“Okay, fair enough. If he fails, then we all fail. But at least we’ll feel that we’ve done whatever we could to bring back CI, that we haven’t simply knuckled under to Halliday and an NSA run rampant.”
Soraya sighed, picked her way across the carpet to join Marks. “Where the hell did Willard get the funding to resurrect Treadstone?”
Just by asking the question she saw she had agreed to his offer. She knew she was hooked. But while weighing this understanding, she almost missed the pained look on Peter’s face. “I’m not going to like it, am I?”
“I didn’t like it, either, but…” He shrugged. “Does the name Oliver Liss mean anything to you?”
“One of the principals of Black River?” She goggled at him. Then she burst out laughing. “You’re kidding, right? Jason and I were instrumental in discrediting Black River. I thought the three of them were all indicted.”
“Liss’s partners were, but he severed all ties to Black River months before the shit you and Bourne threw hit the fan. No one could find a trace of his participation in the illegal activity.”
“He knew?”
Peter shrugged. “Possibly he was simply lucky.”
She gave him a penetrating look. “I don’t believe that and neither do you.”
Marks nodded.
“You’re damn right I don’t like it. What does that say about Willard’s sense of ethics?”
Marks took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Halliday plays as dirty as anyone I’ve ever known. Whatever it takes to defeat him, bring it on, I say.”
“Even making a deal with the devil.”
“Perhaps it takes one devil to destroy another devil.”
“Whatever the truth of what you say, this is a treacherous slope, Peter.”
Marks gri
Moira Trevor, Lady Hawk pistol strapped into her thigh holster, stood looking at the empty offices of her new but compromised company, Heartland Risk Management, LLC. The space had so quickly become toxic that she wasn’t sad to leave it, only dismayed because she had been in business for less than a year. There was nothing here now but dust, not even memories she could take with her.
She turned to leave and saw a man filling the open doorway to the outside hall. He was dressed in an expensively cut three-piece suit, spit-shined English brogues, and despite the clear weather he carried a neatly rolled umbrella with a hardwood handle.
“Ms. Trevor, I presume?”
She stared hard at him. He had hair like steel bristles, black eyes, and an accent she couldn’t quite place. He was holding a plain brown paper bag, which she eyed with suspicion. “And you are?”
“Bi
“Lionel? You must be joking, no one’s named Lionel these days.”
He looked at her unblinkingly. “May I come in, Ms. Trevor?”
“Why would you want to do that?”
“I’m here to make you an offer.”
She hesitated for a moment, then nodded. He crossed the threshold without seeming to have moved.
Peering around, he said, “Oh, dear. What have we here?”
“Desolation Row.”
Bi
“What can I do for you, Mr. Bi
She tensed as he lifted the brown paper bag and opened it.
Taking out two paper cups, he said, “I brought us some cardamom tea.”
The first clue. “How nice,” Moira said, accepting the tea. She took off the plastic top to peer inside. It was pale with milk. She took a sip. And very sweet. “Thank you.”
“Ms. Trevor, I am an attorney. My client would like to hire you.”
“Lovely.” She looked around Desolation Row. “I could use some work.”
“My client wants you to find a notebook computer that was stolen from him.”
Moira paused with the cup halfway to her lips. Her coffee-colored eyes watched Bi
“You must have me confused with a private detective. There’s no shortage of those in the district, any one of them-”
“My client wants you, Ms. Trevor. Only you.”
She shrugged. “He’s barking up the wrong tree. Sorry. Not my line of work.”
“Oh, but it is.” There was nothing sinister or even discomforting in Bi
Moira, astonished, said nothing.
“From where my client sits,” he continued, “you’re the perfect candidate to find and retrieve his stolen laptop.”
“And where, exactly, does your client sit?”
Bi
“I’m not interested in money.”
“Despite needing the work?” Bi
Moira froze, her heartbeat accelerating. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You have a traitor in your organization,” Bi
Moira frowned. “Just who is your client, Mr. Bi
“I’m not authorized to reveal his identity.”
“And I suppose you’re also not authorized to tell me how he knows so much about me?”
Bi
She nodded. “Fine. I’ll find my goddamn traitor myself.”
Oddly, this response brought a cat-like smile to Bi
“I’m sure you’ll find a way to make it up in fees.”
“Once you get to know me, you’ll realize I’m not that sort of man.”
“You’re being overly optimistic,” Moira said.