Стюарт Вудс - Choppy Water

Bess laughed.

Finally, he turned his attention to her. “The boys are going to have to get used to you,” he said. “They’re unaccustomed to meeting the needs of women.”

“Then I’ll help them out,” Bess said. “By the way, how are you planning to change history with only four men and a woman to help you?”

“History moves in inches,” he said. “But sometimes with a big step.”

“How big are we talking?”

“I think you know who we’re talking about. You visited her home briefly.”

“Ah, that would be a big step, and I wouldn’t be sorry to see her take it.”

“You may have that opportunity. If everybody, including you, does his job well, no one will even notice that it was done but our masters.”

“Masters? Sounds fascinating,” she said.

Any reply was interrupted by the arrival of their first course. Then Sykes stopped talking and started eating.

“They’re eating,” Tom said, “and Sykes isn’t talking.”

“Are your agents getting a divorce?” Stone asked.

Tom laughed. “They’d have to get married first.”

Bess restrained herself from asking further questions for the rest of dinner; instead, she just let him ramble on about the Army, about dealing with Washington, about hunting and fishing — whatever crossed his mind. He became more relaxed as the evening wore on and the level in the wine bottle went down. He mentioned her lesbianism only once, and in regretful terms. She reflected that telling him that had been one of her best decisions, as it kept him off her back without arguments.

“Where’d you find the boys?” she asked, while they were waiting for the check.

“They all served under me in the Army,” Sykes replied. “The best of the best, especially Eugene, who is the best shot with a rifle I ever saw.”

“Are there more of them than I’ve met?”

“Let’s just say we have ample backup, should we need it.”

“Who are my orders coming from? You? Or someone further up the line?”

“That’s a bold question, and I won’t answer it now.”

“So you still don’t trust me?”

“Trust has many levels.”

“Where am I on the scale?”

“Let me ask you a question that might answer your question,” Sykes said.

“All right.”

“When everything is ready, will you be willing to pull the trigger yourself?”

Bess thought about that for a minute, just to make him think she was considering it. “Well,” she said, finally, “I think I would be able to do that, but it remains to be seen, doesn’t it?”

“And, based on your response, where would you put yourself on the scale when it comes to trust?”

“At better than ninety-nine percent, I think.”

“Then I’ll trust you all the way to ninety-nine percent,” Sykes said.

“But not one hundred percent?”

“That remains to be seen, doesn’t it?”

The group sat around Stone’s dining table, a large pot of coffee on the table, and listened to the transmission.

“That was live,” Tom Blake said, when there was no further conversation from the restaurant.

“I suppose we couldn’t expect her to say one hundred percent, when she knew she was being recorded,” Stone said.

“On the contrary,” Tom replied. “She’s certainly willing to lie to him, and any court would believe her when she testified she was lying. She’s keeping him on edge. She doesn’t want him to be entirely comfortable with her.”

“Why not?” Bill Wright asked.

“Because she believes if he’s on edge he’ll be more likely to make mistakes,” Tom replied. “Hang on, they’re walking back to the Lowell now.”

The group quieted down and listened.

“Wade,” Bess said, “when are we expected to pull this thing off?”

“They’ll accept my judgment on that. They know that I’m not suicidal, that I will expect to walk away when it’s done. I want to be sure you’ll walk away, too.”

“Thank you for that,” she said. “That’s pretty much how I feel, too.”

He laughed. “Then neither of us is suicidal.”

“I guess not.” They walked a little farther. “How about Eugene? Is he suicidal?”

“That’s an interesting question,” he muttered, half to himself. “On a battlefield, Eugene would walk into gunfire.”

“But where is this battlefield going to be?”

“In an urban area with a good-sized audience, probably. Depends on where the target moves.”

“Will Eugene walk into gunfire in those circumstances?”

“I believe he would. He believes too deeply in his principles to allow himself to walk away.”

“Where did he acquire those principles?” she asked.

“From me,” Sykes replied.

They reached the Lowell and stopped talking as they crossed the lobby. They remained quiet in the elevator, too.

“Good night,” Sykes said when they reached their floor.

“Good night,” Bess replied, letting herself into her room.

She listened at the door for a minute, then crossed the room and rapped on the door to the adjoining suite.

Fisk opened the door. “You okay?” he asked, regarding her closely.

“I’m just fine,” she said. “Did you get it all?”

“Every word,” he replied.

“Then I’m going to bed,” she said, closing the door and locking it behind her. She took off the necklace and earrings and left them on a charging pad Fisk had given her. Then she took off her clothes, got into a nightgown, and went to bed.

“All right,” Tom said to the group. “It’s a conspiracy, and a wider one than Sykes and his four men.”

“I agree,” Bill said, “judging from the way Sykes talked. He referred to his ‘master’ or ‘masters’ in the plural. And he didn’t deny that his orders came from somewhere above.”

Everybody muttered in agreement.

Claire spoke up. “How are we going to control this thing?” she asked. “We can’t just follow Sykes around and wait until he pulls the trigger, as he put it.”

Stone shook his head. “When the trigger is pulled, Sykes will be far away and in enough company to give him an iron-clad alibi.”

“He’ll believe he’s not even a suspect,” Tom said. “He doesn’t know he’s being listened to.”

“Nobody is addressing my question,” Claire said. “How are we going to control this?”

“I think,” Bill said, “we have to offer Sykes an opportunity he can’t afford to miss. Then we control the opportunity.”

Holly spoke for the first time in a while. “I think by ‘opportunity’ you mean me as bait.”

Bill shook his head. “I won’t allow that,” he said. “We just have to make Sykes, and maybe Eugene, think that you’re the bait.”

“We’ve anticipated this situation,” Tom said, “in that, having learned from our dummy in the White House, we’ve been looking for someone who can appear to be you, ma’am.”

“And I won’t allow that,” Holly said. “I’m not going to have some agent or, worse, some innocent risk dying in my place.”

Nobody spoke for a while. Finally, Stone did. “Well, I believe that leaves us at an impasse,” he said. “Bill won’t allow you to be bait, and you won’t allow anyone else to be.”

“It’s late,” Tom said. “I think we should all sleep on this.”

There was a murmur of agreement, and they each got to their feet and shuffled off to their quarters.

Holly turned off the bathroom light and came to bed, crawling, naked, under the covers with Stone.

“I’ve missed you,” he said.

“Same here, pal. Of course, we don’t get this plan right, everybody is going to miss me.”

“You do understand,” Stone said to her, “that whatever the opportunity is, you’re going to be the bait. I don’t see how you can avoid it, short of never leaving this house.”