The Bourne Objective

“It will be harder than ever to get out of London now,” Bourne said shortly.

“I know more ways to get out of London than they do.” He gestured at the cop being interviewed on the screen.

“So do I,” Bourne said. “That isn’t the issue.”

Moreno leaned forward, stubbed out the butt in an ugly free-form ashtray, and lit another. “If you’re waiting for me to apologize, you’re going to be disappointed.”

“Too late for apologies,” Bourne said. “What’s so important about the laptop?”

Moreno shrugged.

“Perlis had the ring,” Bourne said. “He killed Holly to get it.”

“The ring is a symbol of the Severus Domna, all members wear it or carry it unobtrusively.”

“That’s it? If there’s nothing else important about it, why did Perlis murder Holly for it?”

“I don’t know. Maybe he thought it would somehow lead him to the laptop.” Again Moreno stubbed out his cigarette. “Look, is all this distrust because Gustavo was my half brother?”

“I wouldn’t rule it out,” Bourne said.

“Yeah, well, my big brother was a fucking thorn in my side ever since I can remember.”

“Then it’s a good thing for you he’s dead,” Bourne said drily.

Moreno eyed Bourne for a moment. “Jesus Christ, you think I’ve taken over his drug business.”

“I’d be a fool if the thought hadn’t crossed my mind.”

Moreno nodded morosely. “Fair enough.” He sat back and spread his hands wide. “Okay, then, how can I prove myself?”

“Up to you.”

Moreno crossed his arms over his chest and thought a moment. “What do you remember about the four of them: Perlis, Holly, Tracy, and Diego Hererra?”

“Virtually nothing,” Bourne said.

“I imagine you asked Diego about them. What did he tell you?”

“I know about their friendship, their romantic entanglements.”

Moreno frowned. “What romantic entanglements?”

When Bourne told him, he laughed. “Mano, your boy Diego dropped one steaming pile of shit on your doorstep. There was no romance among the four of them. There was only friendship-until, that is, Holly started wearing the ring. One of them, maybe Tracy, I don’t know, became interested in the engraving on the inside. The more interested she became in it, the more Perlis’s curiosity was piqued. He took a photo of the engraving and brought it to Oliver Liss, his boss at the time. This led directly to the tragedy of Holly’s death.”

“How do you know all this?”

“I worked for Black River until Alex Conklin recruited me as a Treadstone agent in place. That gave the old boy a good deal of satisfaction-he despised Liss, as corrupt and exploitative an individual as you’re likely to meet in this business. He feasted off other people’s misery, hosed the government mercilessly, and directed his operatives to commit crimes and atrocities the government dared not do itself. Until you helped sink Black River, Liss was about the most successful modern-day agent of chaos, and believe me that’s saying a lot.”

“That still doesn’t explain how-”

“Back in the day, Perlis reported to me, before Liss took charge of him directly and used him to carry out private missions.”

Bourne nodded. “The ring was one of those private missions.”

“It became one. Perlis needed help, so he came to me. I was the only one he trusted. He told me that the moment Liss saw the ring he flipped out. That was when he ordered Perlis to find the laptop.”

“The one you helped me steal from Jalal Essai.”

“That’s right.”

Bourne frowned. “But what happened to it?”

“You were supposed to deliver it to Conklin personally, but you didn’t.”

“Why not?”

“You discovered something about the laptop-something, you told me, that it was probable Conklin didn’t want you to know. You took it upon yourself to change the mission on the fly.”

“What did I discover?”

Moreno shrugged. “You never told me, and I was too well trained to ask.”

Bourne was sunk deep in thought. The enigma of the ring was growing with every moment. Considering Liss’s reaction when he saw the ring, it seemed likely that it was in some way co

On the TV screen the newsreader had gone on to other stories, in other lands, but the images of Diego Hererra’s corpse being taken out of the Vesper Club continued to flicker through Bourne’s mind. Had it been necessary to kill him, as Moreno had said, or did Moreno have another, darker motive he was keeping from Bourne? The only way to find out the truth was to keep Moreno close to him, and to continue questioning him as subtly as possible until a chink in his armor appeared-or until he proved himself truthful.

“What do you know about Essai?” Bourne asked.

“Besides being a member of the Severus Domna ruling council, not much. He comes from an illustrious family, which dates back all the way to the eleven hundreds, if I’m not mistaken. His ancestors took part in the Moorish invasion of Andalusia. One of them ruled there for a number of years.”

“What about in more modern times?”

“These days no one’s interested in the Berbers or the Amazigh, which we call ourselves.”

“And what of Severus Domna itself?”

“Ah, well, there I can be of some help. First off, I should point out that very little is known about the group. They fly so far below the radar that whatever footprints they leave are all but invisible or easily wiped away. No one knows how large the group is, but members are scattered in virtually every corner of the globe, all in positions of power in governments, businesses, media, and criminal activities. Any industry you care to name they’re in.”

“What’s their aim?” Bourne was thinking of the word Dominion inscribed on the inside of his ring. “What do they want?”

“Power, money, control of world events. Who knows, but that’s a better guess than any other. It’s what everyone wants, isn’t it?”

“If you’re a student of history,” Bourne conceded.

Ottavio Moreno laughed. “So many aren’t.”

Bourne took a breath and let it out slowly. He wondered what it was he’d found out about the laptop that had led him to change the mission. He wasn’t aware of changing any of the Treadstone missions he’d been sent on, if only because he remembered that up until Conklin’s murder he and the Treadstone boss had been on good terms, even friendly ones.

When he mentioned this, Moreno said, “You told me to tell Conklin that Essai didn’t have the laptop, that you didn’t know what had happened to it.”

“And did you?”

“Yes.”

“Why would you do that? Treadstone was paying your salary, Conklin was your boss.”

“I’m not altogether certain,” Ottavio Moreno confessed. “Other than there’s a fundamental difference between field and office perso

So you have come to see the famous Corellos.”

Roberto Corellos, Narsico Skydel’s cousin, smirked at Moira. He sat in a comfortable armchair. The room, spacious, filled with light, with its deep-pile rug, porcelain lamps, paintings on the walls, looked like someone’s living room. But as Moira was about to discover, Bogotá’s prisons weren’t like any others in the world.

“The American press wants to speak with the famous Corellos, now that he’s in La Modelo, now that it’s safe.” He drew a cigar from the breast pocket of his guayabera shirt and with great fanfare bit off the end and lit up, using an old Zippo lighter. With another smirk, he said, “A present from one of my many admirers.” It wasn’t immediately clear whether he meant the robusto or the Zippo.