Jason Matthews - Red Sparrow

“Yeah, and what would you do if she showed up with nothing on under her raincoat? Think you’d call that a recruitment peg?”

Nate looked at Gable, nettled. “I don’t think she’d go with that kind of approach. Just a gut feeling.”

“You wish. Well, it sounds like you guys are stuck. I suggest you think of something to unstick the case. Shake her up, rattle her, upset her equilibrium.” He emptied his beer and called for two more.

“She’s not going to go with the standard canned pitch, Marty,” said Nate. “I’ve been trying to get her to talk more about Russia, about the problems, not pushing her, just giving her openings. Something there in her eyes, but not yet.”

“You have to look for another handle. The good life in the West. Luxury items. Bank account.”

“Wrong direction,” said Nate, “that’s not who she is. She’s idealistic, a nationalist, but she’s not a clunky Soviet. She grew up with ballet, music, books, languages.”

“You talk about the Kremlin? All the shit going on behind the walls?”

“Sure I did,” said Nate. “But she’s too gung-ho. She looks at it all at the level of the Rodina. ”

“Hell’s that?” said Gable.

“The whole national myth—the Motherland, the soil, the hymns, chasing Nazis across the steppes.”

“Oh, yeah, some of those Russian Red Army girls were hot,” said Gable, looking up at the ceiling. “Those tunics and boots, they looked—”

“Is this your idea of operational coaching? Are we discussing DIVA?”

“Well, you have to find something to jolt her out of her defensive position.” He leaned back in his chair, rocking slightly, hands behind his head. “Don’t discount her feelings for you,” said Gable. “Maybe she’ll want to help you in your career, a gift. It won’t feel to her like she’s committing treason. Or maybe she’s a thrill freak. Some agents drink adrenaline.”

Nate’s doorbell rang that night. Dominika stood at the door, her face pinched, eyes red. She was not crying, but her lips trembled and she put her hand over her mouth, as if to stifle a sob. Nate checked the hallway quickly while pulling her inside the door. She was leaden, she didn’t resist his tug. He took her coat. She was wearing a white stretch top and jeans. He lowered her gently onto the couch. She sat at the edge of the cushion, looking down at her hands. Nate didn’t know what was wrong or what to do. She was being sent home short of tour, she was in trouble. That would be a first. Exfiling an SVR officer before recruitment.

Got to calm her down. Whatever it is, she’s upset, vulnerable. A glass of wine, scotch, vodka? Teeth chattering against the glass as she took a sip.

“I know you speak Russian,” Dominika said suddenly in Russian, her voice flat, exhausted. Her head was still down, her hair hung on each side of her face. “You’re the only one I can talk to, a boy from the CIA, it’s mad, isn’t it?”

A boy from the CIA? thought Nate. Fuck’s going on? He sat still, made himself blink. Dominika took another ragged sip.

She started talking slowly, in a low voice. She told him about Marta, about her disappearance. When Nate asked why, Dominika told him about Ustinov. When Nate asked how, she told him about her training. Those rumors about State School Four, he thought. Jesus.

She looked at him then, trying to gauge his reaction on hearing she’d been to Sparrow School. There was no pity, no disdain, his eyes met hers. He was always that way. The purple mantle around his head pulsated. She wanted desperately to trust him. He poured her another glass. “What do you need?” he asked in English. “I want to help you.”

She ignored the question, switched to English. “I know you’re not an American diplomat working in your embassy’s Economic Section. I know you’re a CIA officer. You know very well that I work in the rezidentura in my embassy as an officer of our state security. At least you should have realized it when I told you Volontov was my chief. I suppose you also know my uncle is Vanya Egorov, First Deputy Director of the Service.” Nate tried not to move.

“In Moscow after the AVR, I worked in the Fifth Department in an operation against a French diplomat. It was unsuccessful. Then I was assigned to Helsinki.” Dominika looked up at Nate. Her face was puffy. She looked at him searchingly, and he reached out and held her hand. It felt cold to the touch.

“Marta was my friend. She served loyally all her life, they gave her medals, a pension, an overseas posting. She was strong, independent. She had no regrets about her life, she enjoyed everything. In the time I knew her, she showed me who I am.” She squeezed Nate’s hand slightly.

“I don’t know what happened to Marta, but she’s gone, without a word, and I know she’s dead. She never did anything to them. My uncle is afraid of exposure. He would protect himself. There’s a man, a koshmar, a nightmare creature who belongs to my uncle. He would use him for such a thing.”

“Are you in danger?” asked Nate. His thoughts were racing. She was talking about past operations, a political assassination, liquidation of one of their own personnel, scandal at the top of the SVR. She was dictating at least a half dozen intel reports right there, from the couch. He didn’t dare take notes, he had to keep her rolling.

“You were involved in the Ustinov affair,” said Nate, “so your uncle may be nervous about you.”

She shook her head. “My uncle knows I cannot hurt him. My mother is in Moscow. He uses her as a zalozhnica, a hostage, like in the old days. Besides, he trained me, put me through school, sent me abroad. I am as much his creature as that monster of his.

“I was sent to Helsinki to meet you, to develop a friendship with you,” Dominika said. “My uncle says he considers me one of his operations officers, but he looks at me as his little Sparrow, right out of the 1960s. They have been impatient with the progress I have been making with you. They want to hear how I took you to bed.”

“I’m willing to help you there,” said Nate. She stared back at him and sniffled thinly.

“You are pleased to continue joking,” she said. “Perhaps you will not think it is so funny when I tell you that I am supposed to find out about your former activities in Moscow, about the mole you meet. Uncle Vanya sent me to watch you, to see if you become operational, active, like you did for two weeks last month.”

The mole you meet? Nate felt like the child standing beside the tracks as a fast freight roars by, inches from being swept away. He tried not to react, but he knew Dominika saw it in his face.

“I did not say anything to that slug Volontov,” said Dominika. “Marta was still alive then. She knew what I had decided.” Nate was trying to concentrate on her words while numbly contemplating the close call with MARBLE. They had had no idea of the danger. Dominika’s decision not to report most probably saved his life.

“Since I bumped into you at the swimming pool, I was trying to establish a friendship with you,” said Dominika. “In many ways, we were doing the same thing to each other. I know you were trying to identify my weaknesses, my ujazvimoe mesto, what is the word, vulnerability ?

“Your charming pursuit ensured only that we would spend more time together. I suppose that was Uncle Vanya’s plan all along. What surprised me was that I continued to let you work on me because—it dawned on me—I wanted you to continue to work on me. I liked being with you.”

Nate sat motionless, still holding her hand. Jesus Christ, she had been working him, just like Gable thought. The SVR were hunting for MARBLE. Thank God she had decided the way she had. And, thought Nate, God bless Marta, wherever she was.