discovered, but all the same it’s there.”

When Hauser glanced again out the back window a car was coming toward them. He

clamped his jaws shut, watched as the vehicle passed by, then visibly relaxed as it drove

on down the road.

“Herr Mьller was not altogether truthful. The delays were caused by this software flaw,

nothing else. I should know, since I was part of the software design team. We tried for a

patch, but it’s been devilishly difficult, and we ran out of time.”

“Just how serious is this flaw?” Moira said.

“It depends on whether you’re an optimist or a pessimist.” Hauser ducked his head,

embarrassed. “As I said, it might never be discovered.”

Moira glanced out the window for a time, thinking that she shouldn’t ask the next

question because, as Noah told her in no uncertain terms, the Firm was now out of

ensuring the security of NextGen’s LNG terminal.

And then she heard herself say, “What if I’m a pessimist?”

Peter Marks found Rodney Feir, chief of field support, in the CI caff, eating a bowl of

New England clam chowder. Feir looked up, gestured to Marks to sit. Peter Marks had

been elevated to chief of operations after the ill-starred Rob Batt was outed as an NSA

rat.

“How’s it going?” Feir said.

“How d’you think it’s going?” Marks parked himself on the chair opposite Feir. “I’ve

been vetting every one of Batt’s contacts for any sign of NSA taint. It’s daunting and

frustrating work. You?”

“As exhausted as you, I expect.” Feir sprinkled oyster crackers into the chowder. “I’ve

been briefing the new DCI on everything from agents in the field to the cleaning firm

we’ve used for the past twenty years.”

“D’you think she’ll work out?”

Feir knew he had to be careful here. “I’ll say this for her: She’s a stickler for detail. No stone unturned. She’s not leaving anything to chance.”

“That’s a relief.” Marks twiddled a fork between his thumb and fingers. “What we

don’t need is another crisis. I’d be happy with someone who can right this listing ship.”

“My sentiments exactly.”

“The reason I’m here,” Marks said, “is I’m having a staffing problem. I’ve lost some

people to attrition. Of course, that’s inevitable. I thought I’d get some good recruits

graduating from the program, but they went to Typhon. I’m in need of a short-term fix.”

Feir chewed on a mouthful of gritty clam bits and soft potato cubes. He’d diverted

those graduates to Typhon and had been waiting for Marks to come to him ever since.

“How can I help?”

“I’d like some of Dick Symes’s people to be assigned to my directorate.” Dick Symes

was the chief of intelligence. “Just temporarily, you understand, until I can get some raw

recruits through training and orientation.”

“Have you talked to Dick?”

“Why bother? He’ll just tell me to go to hell. But you can plead my case to Hart. She’s

so snowed under that you’re the one best suited to get her to listen to me. If she makes the call Dick can yell all he wants, it won’t matter.”

Feir wiped his lips. “What number of personnel are we talking here, Peter?”

“Eighteen, two dozen tops.”

“Not inconsiderable. The DCI is going to want to know what you have in mind.”

“I’ve got a brief detailing it all ready to go,” Marks said. “I shoot it to you

electronically, you walk it in to her personally.”

Feir nodded. “I think that can be arranged.”

Relief flooded Marks’s face. “Thanks, Rodney.”

“Don’t mention it.” He began to dig into what was left of the chowder. As Marks was

about to rise, he said, “Do you by any chance know where Soraya is? She’s not in her

office and she’s not answering her cell.”

“Unh-unh.” Marks resettled himself. “Why?”

“No reason.”

Something in Feir’s voice gave him pause. “No reason? Really?”

“Just, you know how office scuttlebutt can be.”

“Meaning?”

“You two are tight, aren’t you.”

“Is that what you heard?”

“Well, yeah.” Feir placed his spoon into the empty bowl. “But if it isn’t true-”

“I don’t know where she is, Rodney.” Marks’s gaze drifted off. “We never had that

kind of thing going.”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

Marks waved away his apology. “Forget it. I have. So what do you want to talk with

her about?”

This was what Feir was hoping he’d say. According to the general, he and LaValle

required intel on the nuts and bolts of how Typhon worked. “Budgets. She’s got so many

agents in the field, the DCI wants an accounting of their expenses-which, frankly, hasn’t

been done since Martin died.”

“That’s understandable, given what’s been going on in here lately.”

Feir shrugged deferentially. “I’d do it myself; Soraya’s got more on her plate than she

can handle, I imagine. Trouble is, I don’t even know where the files are.” He was going

to add: Do you? but decided that would be overselling it.

Marks thought a minute. “I might be able to help you there.”

How badly does your shoulder hurt?” Devra said.

Arkadin, pressed against her body, his powerful arms around her, said, “I don’t know

how to answer that. I have an extremely high tolerance for pain.”

The airplane’s cramped bathroom allowed him to concentrate exclusively on her. It

was like being in a coffin together, like being dead, but in a strange afterlife where only they existed.

She smiled up at him as one of his hands traced its way from the small of her back to

her neck. His thumb pressed against her jaw, gently tilted her head up while his fingers

tightened on the nape of her neck.

He leaned in, his weight arching her torso backward above the sink. He could see the

back of her head in the mirror, his face about to eclipse hers. A flame of emotion

flickered to life, illuminating the soulless void inside him.

He kissed her.

“Gently,” she whispered. “Relax your lips.”

Her moist lips opened beneath his, her tongue searched for his, tentatively at first, then

with an unmistakable hunger. His lips trembled. He had never felt anything when kissing

a woman. In fact, he’d always done his best to avoid it, not knowing what it was for, or

why women sought it so relentlessly. An exchange of fluids, that’s all it was to him, like

a procedure performed in a doctor’s office. The best he could say was that it was painless, that it was over quickly.

The electricity that shot through him when his lips met hers stunned him. The sheer

pleasure of it astonished him. It hadn’t been like this with Marlene; it hadn’t been like

this with anyone. He did not know what to make of the tremor in his knees. Her sweet,

moaning exhalations entered him like silent cries of ecstasy. He swallowed them whole,

and wanted more.

Wanting was something Arkadin was unused to. Need was the word that had driven his

life up to this moment: He needed to revenge himself on his mother, he needed to escape

home, he needed strike out on his own, no matter the course, he needed to bury rivals and

enemies, he needed to destroy anyone who got close to his secrets. But want? That was

another matter entirely. Devra defined want for him. And it was only when he was certain

he no longer needed her that his desire revealed itself. He wanted her.

When he lifted her skirt, probing underneath, her leg drew up. Her fingers nimbly freed

him from his clothing. Then he stopped thinking altogether.

Afterward, when they’d returned to their seats, making their way through the line of

glaring passengers queued up to use the lavatory, Devra burst into laughter. Arkadin sat

watching her. This was another thing unique about her. Anyone else would have asked,