W. Griffin - Covert Warriors

So what to do about that? They can’t whack me-although that remains a possibility for the future-because right now they need me.

She knew that I was talking to Lammelle on the phone, even from the one side of the conversation I let her hear.

So, just as fast as she came up with the address for Juan Carlos, when she saw that I was already challenging Pevsner’s authority, she decided the way to deal with the situation was in bed. She could control me there.

And why shouldn’t she think so?

Less than twenty-four hours after we first met, she was in my bed-and has been leading me around by the wang ever since.

So she grabbed hold of it under the table here.

And I can’t even get really pissed off at her. She is what she is, and what she is is a fourth-hell, maybe sixth-generation Soviet spook.

Can I be pissed at me-James Bond Junior?

Sure.

Because James Bond Junior is acting not like even a junior spook-one six months out of Fort Huachuca or the Farm-but like some seventeen-year-old with raging hormones who just got laid for the first time and is convinced there has never been love like this since Adam screwed Eve in the Garden of Eden.

And because it’s humiliating having to face proof of my gross stupidity.

Sweaty came out of the bathroom, holding a towel by its edges.

“Showtime!” she said, and dropped the towel.

That has to be the most beautiful woman in the world.

She walked on her toes to the bed quickly and with exquisite grace and got in beside him.

She laid her body half across Castillo, making him think that she had the most wonderful breasts he had ever encountered by any standard he could think of.

“You play the fool so well,” she said, “that sometimes I forget that you’re not a fool at all.”

He could feel her breath against his ear.

“Flattery will get you everywhere,” he said. “But what specifically do you have in mind?”

“Aleksandr’s face, when you told him you never discuss business when you’re drinking, especially with this family, was priceless.”

Well, here it is. The schmooze starts.

“Beware of Russians bearing booze is my motto, baby.”

“And why didn’t you tell me you’re a legend?”

“Who said I was?”

“Kiril. When I said, ‘Thank you for letting Carlos fly as your co-pilot,’ he said, ‘I was glad to have him. I don’t think anyone knows more about flying in the mountains than he does. He even wrote a book about it. He’s a legend in the American army.’ Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Modesty.”

She pinched his nipple.

Well, she’s a good schmoozer. I almost believe her.

“Can I ask you a personal question?” he said.

“No.”

“What kind of don’t-get-pregnant medicine do you take?” he pursued, then thought: Where the hell did that come from? Did Alek put a little sodium pentothal in that vodka?

“I should have known. .” she said with a sigh.

“You’re not answering the question.”

“You really want to know?”

“I really want to know.”

Why not? Like it says on the CIA’s wall in Langley, “Ye shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free.”

“When I stopped living with Evgeny, I stopped taking those once-a-day pills.”

“You were on that stuff when you were married to Evgeny? Why?”

“I didn’t want his baby, obviously.”

Charley thought: And since you certainly don’t want mine. .

He said: “And now?”

“When I knew Dmitri and I were going to try to get out, I went to a Danish gynecologist and she gave me a shot.”

“What kind of a shot?”

“I don’t know what it was called, but she said it would keep me from getting with child for a year. .”

In case you just happened to meet somebody who could be useful if you let him into your pants, right? Like me?

“. . which was enough. I didn’t mind dying, but I didn’t want the bastard child of an SVR interrogator. .”

“What?”

“The first step when breaking down a senior female traitor is to rape her,” Sweaty said matter-of-factly. “Multiple times, different men, over a forty-eight-hour period. I could handle that, but I didn’t want a child coming into the world that way. If they shot me, it wouldn’t have been a problem, but they could have-probably would have-just kept me in prison, where I would wind up giving birth to the bastard child. So I got the shot from the Danish doctor.”

Update on the epiphany: She’s not making this up.

Jesus H. Christ!

“Two weeks later I met you,” Sweaty went on. “And sure enough, the shot kept me from being with child for a year. Actually for fourteen months.”

“So what are you going to do now?”

She met his eyes, and after a moment said: “In seven months, we’re going to have a baby. I told you I was going to give you a son. Sons. Didn’t you believe me?”

He stared into her ice blue eyes, now genuinely warm, and thought: Calling Charley Castillo a miserable lowlife sickly suspicious sonofabitch is the monumental understatement of all time.

Then, taking him absolutely by surprise, his chest started to heave and his eyes teared.

“Oh, God!” he said in anguish. “Oh, Sweaty!”

“I thought you’d be happy?” she said, confused.

“Sweetheart, I am so happy I think I’m going to have a heart attack.”

The Breakfast Room Casa en el Bosque San Carlos de Bariloche Rio Negro Province, Argentina 0815 18 April 2007

Aleksandr Pevsner, Tom Barlow, Nicolai Tarasov, Stefan Koussevitzky, Kiril Koshkov, and Anatoly Blatov were sitting around the long table when Castillo and Svetlana walked in, holding hands, trailed by Lester Bradley, his arms full with two laptops and a Brick. Janos was in his usual place, sitting in a chair against the wall.

A maid and one of Pevsner’s ex-Spetsnaz waiters were clearing away the breakfast dishes.

I knew Alek was going to play King of the Hill sooner or later, and that just won’t work. Better settle it once and for all right now.

“Sweaty, I don’t think the Reichsmarschall plans to feed us,” Castillo said in English. “Do you think we could possibly have annoyed him in some way?”

“The Reichsmarschall ,” Pevsner replied sarcastically, “didn’t know how long it would be before-or even if-Romeo and Juliet could bear to be torn apart. So we decided we’d better start without you.”

Castillo looked around the table. Tom Barlow was smiling. The others were stone-faced.

“Nice try, Hermann, but no brass ring,” Castillo said. “Starting without me would be what Kiril, Anatoly, and I would call really flying blind, and you know it. Or you should.”

Pevsner stared at him icily but didn’t reply.

Castillo turned to the waiter and, switching to Russian, ordered: “Set places for us. Put me at the head of the table, where Mr. Pevsner is now sitting. Podpolkovnik Alekseeva will sit to my right, and Mr. Bradley to my left.”

The waiter looked at Pevsner for direction. He got none.

“Your house, Alek, your call,” Castillo said. “You either stop behaving like you think you’re Ivan the Terrible and I’m a second lieutenant of your household cavalry, or we’re out of here.”

“ We’re out of here?” Pevsner parroted sarcastically.

“ETA of Jake Torine and the Gulfstream at San Carlos de Bariloche International is twelve fifteen,” Castillo said. “Unless you agree that I’m the best man to deal with our mutual problem, I’ll just get on it and leave you here to deal with your problem by yourself.”