David Hagberg - End Game

One of the officers who had conducted their initial interview came in. “If you will come with me, sir, I’ll have you signed out and your belongings returned to you.”

“On my way. Thanks, kemo sabe,” McGarvey said. He switched off the phone, and this time it stayed off.

“Sir.”

“Where is Major Lucien?”

“He’s been called away.”

Room service had brought up a cheese plate with mousse and pâté de foie gras, along with a good bottle of ice-cold Pinot Grigio. Pete and Alex sat at a small marble-topped table in front of the open window. That she had a minder wasn’t lost on Alex, but she made no bones about it, for which Pete was grateful.

She didn’t like the woman, but she felt sorry for her. Being an NOC had been the only possible profession for her, and yet the years of service in the field, and since Iraq, the constant looking over her shoulder, had taken its toll. She could see it around the corners of her eyes, the sometimes firm set of her mouth, and the tilt of her head, as if she were listening for something gaining on her.

Bete was waiting downstairs for McGarvey to arrive, and when he got there, they would head to de Gaulle, where Pete would take Alex’s place on the Turkish Airlines flight, and Alex would go with Mac on the CIA’s Gulfstream. They would leave as soon as possible in order to get to Tel Aviv before Pete’s flight arrived. He wanted to be at immigration first to see who showed up to meet the flight.

“It’s a dangerous game you’re playing,” Pete said.

“You, too, going in my place.”

“I don’t get it. Someone tries to kill you here, and yet you’ve sent a message to George and he’s told you to come to Tel Aviv. Right into the hornets’ nest. What do you think you’ll achieve?”

Alex shrugged. “If he kills me, then I guess it’ll prove he still has something to hide after all these years. But you have to know he isn’t your serial killer.”

“How did you send him the message that you wanted to meet? I mean, did you call some number direct? Maybe an Israel country code?”

Alex told her about the Mossad-backed travel agency, but Otto had already traced the Turkish Airlines booking to the agency on the Champs-Élysées not far from the sidewalk café.

“We were given a code phrase to use if we needed help. The travel agent made the call or sent the e-mail.”

“So the call could have gone to a private cell phone at Langley. Or more likely to a blind number somewhere in the vicinity. The killer still could be George. He could have hired the hit man here in Paris, and since that failed, he’s made arrangements for you to be taken out in Tel Aviv.”

“We’ll see when we get there,” Alex said.

She seemed to Pete to be resigned. Too resigned? “Do you think you’ll recognize him?”

“It’s always the eyes,” Alex said. “You can wear contacts and change the color, and you can even have plastic surgery. But you can’t hide what’s in them.” She nodded. “If we come face-to-face, I’ll recognize him.”

“And then what?”

“I’ll ask him why he did it. We kept our mouths shut; there was no reason to kill everyone. And especially not the way he did it.”

“The same as you and he did in Iraq.”

“For different reasons. I keep telling you the same thing. Anyway, we’ve grown up since then — or at least, I have.”

Pete’s cell phone vibrated. It was Mac. “We’re on the way up. Are you ready to leave?”

“Anytime you are. I’m in her room with our things.”

“You’re taking a cab to the airport. Do you have her passport?”

“The pictures don’t match.”

“They never do,” McGarvey said.

Pete hung up. “One last thing I don’t get,” she told Alex. “When Walt Wager was murdered, why didn’t you contact the others and set up a defensive position together? You’d worked as a team before.”

“When Joseph bought it in Athens, I thought it was just an accident. But when Walt was killed, I knew what was going on. The only trouble was, I didn’t know where the rest of them were.”

“Okay, I can buy the likelihood that you guys didn’t know where the others were hiding. But after Wager went down, you didn’t even try to look for the others. You were out just for yourself, just to save your own skin.”

“You’re damned right,” Alex said. “Survival is the name of the game — the only game worth being good at.”

She got up and went to her bag, grabbing a billed cap. She gave it to Pete. “Wear this — it’ll at least cover your hair. You’re flying business class, but don’t get off at the front of the crowd. Stick around till most of the tourist-class passengers get off. Might buy you a little time.”

Someone knocked.

Pete drew her weapon and went to the door. “Who is it?” she asked.

“Me,” Mac said.

Pete let him in. Bete hadn’t come with him.

“We’re going first,” he said. “Give us five minutes, then check out and take a cab to the airport. But listen: anything goes wrong, even if you have the slightest suspicion something is about to happen, push the panic button. Otto’s programs are watching for it.”

Star 111 on Pete’s sat phone would set off an alarm that Otto would pick up immediately. It would give her precise GPS position anywhere on Earth and at any altitude.

“Nothing’s going to happen in the air, and you’ll be in Tel Aviv at the international terminal when I get there,” she said, though she had a little flutter in her stomach.

She was primarily an interrogator — and a damned good one. It was a job she’d always liked. The only reason she’d become a field agent was because of Mac. She supposed she had fallen in love with him almost from the first moment she’d laid eyes on him. But she had given him room because of the death of his wife.

“Give me your weapon,” he said.

Pete handed over her pistol, and Mac stuffed it into his bag. Then, at the door with Alex and her attaché case, he turned back and went to her.

“When this is over, we’re going to New York to dinner in the Village. I know an Italian restaurant, homemade pasta, a great Bolognese sauce, and Valpolicella. It’ll be a Saturday, and we’ll make it late and wander around until the Sunday Times comes out. We’ll find a bakery just opening and have coffee and something sweet for dessert. Date?”

“Absolutely,” Pete said.

He kissed her on the cheek, and he and Alex left.

She stood for a long moment or two before she went back to the window and looked down at the pretty courtyard. She hadn’t known for sure if she had a chance with him. But now she knew, and she also knew she would move heaven and earth for him.

Traffic was heavy out to Charles de Gaulle, as it always was on just about any highway in or around Paris. The cabby dropped Pete off at the Turkish Airlines counter, where she showed her Lois Wheeler identification and picked up her boarding pass.

At the international terminal, she showed her passport and boarding pass. The male security officer looked at the photo, then at Pete. “Doesn’t look like you, Madame,” he said.

“It was taken a few years ago. I’m a little older now.”

“Your hair is not the same.”

Pete smiled. “What woman’s is?” she asked. “It’s our prerogative.”

The officer looked again at the passport photo. “What is your birth date?”

Pete gave him the date from the passport. It was a few years older than she was.

The officer initialed her boarding pass and handed it and her passport back. “The photo does you no justice, Madame.”

Her shoulder bag and the one carry-on bag were sent through the X-ray machine, and she passed through the security arch.