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the real-time backdrop against which the attack was scheduled to take place.
Icoupov became aware that three of his aides were clustered around his desk.
Apparently, they’d been trying to talk to him.
“What is it?” His voice was testy, the better to cover up his grief and inattention.
Ismail, the most senior of his aides, cleared his throat. “We wanted to know who you
intend to send after Jason Bourne now that Harun…” His voice trailed off.
Icoupov had been contemplating the same question. He’d made a mental list that
included any number of people he could send, but he kept eliminating most of them, for
one reason or another. But on the second and third run through he began to realize that
these reasons were in one way or another trivial. Now, as Ismail asked the question again,
he knew.
He looked up into his aides’ anxious faces and said. “It’s me. I’m going after Bourne
myself.”
Twenty-Four
IT WAS disturbingly hot in the Alter Botanischer Garten, and as humid as a rain
forest. The enormous glass panels were opaque with beads of mist sliding down their
faces. Moira, who had already taken off her gloves and long winter coat, now shrugged
out of the thick cable-knit sweater that helped protect her from Munich’s chill, damp
morning, which could penetrate to the bone.
When it came to German cities, she much preferred Berlin to Munich. For one thing,
Berlin had for many years been on the cutting edge of popular music. Berlin was where
such notable pop icons as David Bowie, Brian Eno, and Lou Reed, among many others,
had come to recharge their creative batteries by listening to what musicians far younger
than they were creating. For another, it hadn’t lost its legacy of the war and its aftermath.
Berlin was like a living museum that was reinventing itself with every breath it took.
There was, however, a strictly personal reason why she preferred Berlin. She came for
much the same reason Bowie did, to get away from stale habits, to breathe the fresh air of
a city unlike those she knew. At an early age Moira became bored with the familiar.
Every time she felt compelled to join a group because that was what her friends were
doing she sensed she was losing a piece of herself. Gradually, she realized that her
friends had ceased to become individuals, devolving into a cliquey “they” she found
repellent. The only way to escape was to flee beyond the borders of the United States.
She could have chosen London or Barcelona, as some other college sophomores did,
but she was a freak for Bowie and the Velvet Underground, so Berlin it was.
The botanical garden was built in the mid-1800s as an exhibition hall, but eighty years
later, after its garden was destroyed by a fire, it gained new life as a public park. Outside, the awful bulk of the prewar Fountain of Neptune cast a shadow across the space through
which she strolled.
The array of gorgeous specimens on display inside this glassed-in space only
underscored the fact that Munich itself was without verve or spark. It was a plodding city
of untermenchen, businessmen as gray as the city, and factories belching smoke into the
low, angry sky. It was also a focal point of European Muslim activity, which, in one of
those classic action-reaction scenarios, made it a hotbed of skinhead neo-Nazis.
Moira glanced at her watch. It was precisely 9:30 AM, and here came Noah, striding
toward her. He was cool and efficient, personally opaque, even withholding, but he
wasn’t a bad sort. She’d have refused him as a handler if he was; she was senior enough
to command that respect. And Noah did respect her, she was certain of that.
In many ways Noah reminded her of Joha
was at the university. Actually, Joha
ca
would be more responsive to a fellow female student. Ultimately, Moira had met with
Joha
exactly. She’d never told anyone, including Martin or Bourne, who she really worked for.
To do so would have violated her contract with the firm.
She stopped in front of the pinkly intimate blooms of an orchid, speckled like the
bridge of a virgin’s nose. Berlin had also been the site of her first passionate love affair, the kind that curled your toes, obliterated your focus on responsibility and the future. The affair almost ruined her, principally because it possessed her like a whirlwind and, in the process, she’d lost any sense of herself. She became a sexual instrument on which her
lover played. What he wanted, she wanted, and so dissolution.
In the end, it was Joha
from self was immensely painful. Especially because two months afterward her lover
died. For a time, her rage at Joha
she hadn’t allowed herself to fall for Martin, though part of her yearned for his touch.
Jason Bourne was another story entirely, for she had once again been overtaken by the
whirlwind. But this time, she wasn’t diminished. Partly, that was because she was mature
now and knew better. Mainly, though, it was because Bourne asked nothing of her. He
sought neither to lead nor to dominate her. Everything with him was clean and open. She
moved on to another orchid, this one dark as night, with a tiny lantern of yellow hidden in its center. It was ironic, she thought, that despite his own issues, she had never before met a man so in control of himself. She found his self-assurance a compelling aphrodisiac, as
well as a powerful antidote to her own i
That was another irony, she thought. If asked, Bourne would surely say that he was a
pessimist, but being one herself, she knew an optimist when she met one. Bourne would
take on the most impossible situations and somehow find a solution. Only the greatest of
optimists could accomplish that.
Hearing soft footfalls, she turned to see Noah, shoulders hunched within a tweed
overcoat. Though born in Israel, he could pass for a German now, perhaps because he’d
lived in Berlin for so long. He’d been Joha
When Joha
“Hello, Moira.” He had a narrow face below dark hair flecked with premature gray.
His long nose and serious mouth belied a keen sense of the absurd. “No Bourne, I see.”
“I did my best to get him on board at NextGen.”
Noah smiled. “I’m sure you did.”
He gestured and they began to walk together. Few people were around this gloomy
morning so there was no chance of being overheard.
“But to be honest, from what you told me, it was a long shot.”
“I’m not disappointed,” Moira said. “I detested the entire experience.”
“That’s because you have feelings for him.”
“What if I do?” Moira said rather more defensively than she expected.
“You tell me.” Noah watched her carefully. “There is a consensus among the partners
that your emotions are interfering with your work.”
“Where the hell is that coming from?” she said.
“I want you to know that I’m on your side.” His voice was that of a psychoanalyst
calming an increasingly agitated patient. “The problem is you should have come here
days ago.” They passed a worker tending a swath of African violets. When they were out