by Andrew Watts
Ava described the security procedure, including the body scan. “It’s a double door that leads into an airlock of sorts. Then the security guard buzzes us in.”
Rinaldi said, “Hmm. Okay. I’ll relay this to my team. They are very familiar with that type of equipment. We’ll figure something out. We’ll provide you with something innocuous you can bring in there—maybe something you can wear—that will help us gather the information we need.”
Ava frowned at Colt. “You can trust them, Ava,” he assured her. “I’ve worked with them before. It’ll be okay.”
She bit her lower lip. “Okay. I’ll think about it.”
The week went by fast. Colt visited Pax AI each day, attending meetings and going over financials, taking time with different project teams to look at their work. The leadership team worked from the fourth floor most of the week, getting ready for their big demonstration.
After hours Colt worked with the counterintelligence unit. Weng had briefed him on her conversation with SANDSTONE, and they had set up another meeting for Wednesday. It was the earliest she could make it. And if she came through, they just might get the name of whoever was inside Pax AI, stealing their data.
Colt didn’t see Ava as much over the next few days. She had lunch with him once and coffee at the Starbucks across from the Pax AI headquarters. She agreed to meet with Wilcox and Rinaldi again the morning of the demonstration.
Colt ordered one of the self-driving taxis and picked her up, taking her to meet with Wilcox early in the morning.
Wilcox handed Ava a pair of shoes. “Please change into these. Check that they fit. We have a few extra sizes in case they don’t.”
Ava sat on the couch and removed hers, then slipped on the pair that Wilcox had given her.
“The heel of each shoe contains a communications device.” Then he ran through the procedures Ava was to follow later that day.
“So you’ll go through the fourth-floor security chamber just like normal. If they ask you to take off your shoes, go ahead and do it. Don’t be alarmed. Nothing will show up on the scanner. That’s it. You don’t have to press any buttons or anything.”
“What if they pick up the devices in the scan?” Ava said.
“They won’t. We’re familiar with their equipment.”
She looked nervous. “You’re sure it won’t set off any alarms.”
“We’re sure,” Wilcox said. “Colt will be in the building with you. He’ll know when you’re up on the fourth floor. He’s going to be in his office on the second floor. When Colt is sure you are up there, he’ll trigger the device to activate it.”
“How will he do that?”
Wilcox shook his head. “Don’t worry about that. All you need to know is your shoes won’t feel or sound any different. It will be unnoticeable to you. But you’ll need to be up on the fourth floor. And Colt, we won’t want you to activate the device unless she’s there. That could cause issues with Pax AI detecting electronic emissions.”
“Understood,” said Colt.
“And this is all legal?” asked Ava.
“Yes, of course it is,” replied Rinaldi. “We’re the FBI, ma’am.”
“You’ll do fine.” Colt gave her a gentle pat on the shoulder.
She looked petrified. “Okay. Well, I guess it’s time. What should I do with these?” She held up her other pair of shoes. Wilcox took them and set them by the door.
Colt said, “Ava, I won’t be going to work with you. I have another meeting this morning. But I’ll be in by the time the demonstration begins.”
“All right.”
Wilcox said, “After your meeting is over, come back here and I’ll get the device and we’ll swap shoes again.”
They stood up and she nodded. They thanked her again and she left the room, heading to work.
Colt turned to face Wilcox. “Have we heard from SANDSTONE yet?”
“Weng just texted. Your agent hasn’t confirmed she’ll be there yet.”
Colt cursed. He and Weng had sent SANDSTONE a meeting time and place yesterday. It was unlike Marisha to be this tardy in her responses.
“I’m going to go join up with Weng so if SANDSTONE shows, we’ll be ready.”
“You need to keep an eye on the clock. I’ll appreciate getting a name from SANDSTONE. But if Ava is in there when their Facility servers communicate with their fourth floor, that could get us a lot more.”
Colt nodded. “I won’t be late.”
27
Colt reached the counterintelligence unit safehouse twenty minutes later. Heather Weng and Jennifer Sims were there, set up for the SANDSTONE meet.
“Anything?” Colt asked.
“She just checked in,” Weng said. “You ready?”
Colt nodded. Weng walked to the back room and opened the gun safe, removing a 9mm pistol and holster and clipping it to the inside of her jeans. “You want one?”
He shook his head. “No, I need to run to Pax AI afterward.”
A few moments later Weng was driving them in a sedan across town. She parked them near the Opera House, a block away from City Hall. They locked the car and began walking, separated by one to two blocks at all times so Weng could help provide counter-surveillance. Both of them wore in-ear headphones, and Sims was monitoring them from the safehouse. A mix of CCTVs provided her with good coverage of the meeting location near the intersection of Market Street and 8th.
After several minutes of doing figure eights around the same few blocks, Weng was sufficiently satisfied Colt was in the clear. “Okay, you’re black. Let’s go.”
Colt turned down Market Street and headed toward the rendezvous.
Now Sims was in his ear. “I think I see SANDSTONE approaching. She’s in a purple shirt. Two blocks to your north. You should see her soon.”
Colt paused at a traffic light. A crowd of pedestrians gathered around him, waiting. The light changed and the crowd surrounding Colt began moving forward across the street.
That’s when he spotted them.
“Gray van, one block to the east. Right across from me,” Colt whispered, looking away and running his hand through his hair to shield his face as he crossed the street.
He turned away from the vehicle and held up his phone like he was taking a selfie, careful to keep the van in the frame. He snapped a picture and sent it to Sims and Weng.
“Got it, what’s up?” Weng responded in his earpiece.
“Sims, zoom in on the man in the passenger seat, and run him through facial recognition, please.”
A beat of silence as Sims digested what he said. Then, “Copy.”
“What’s wrong, Colt?” Weng asked. “I’m passing them now. The light just changed. They left. What did you see?”
Sims said, “The guy in the passenger seat had the same tattoo as the Kozlov shooter.”
“Same location?” Colt asked. That was what he had seen.
“Affirmative.”
Weng said, “They kept driving, Colt. They’re gone.”
Sims said, “Do you want to abort?”
Colt continued walking and could now see Marisha Stepanova only one block away, wearing a travel bag over her shoulder. She had stopped at a newspaper vendor and was looking in Colt’s direction. When she saw him, Marisha looked frightened. She held her phone to her chest, signaling him. Did she want him to hold in position and contact her with his phone?
Something sure as hell wasn’t right. Colt stopped walking and moved to the edge of the sidewalk, gripping the phone in his pocket and pulling it out.
“Sims, you still got eyes on that van?”
“Standby . . . yes. They’re half a mile to the north.”
Colt turned back in the direction he’d come from to see if he was being followed. He saw Weng, who had stopped to keep her distance, but he didn’t spot any coverage.
Almost every instinct told him he needed to abort. Something was very wrong. If that hit team was there, they might have been waiting to find out who he or SAN
DSTONE was meeting. And now Marisha was telling him to hold back.
He slid open the encrypted messaging app. Marisha was now sitting down on a bench one block ahead, her face buried in her phone, typing with her thumbs.
Marisha: Don’t approach.
Colt: Okay.
Marisha: I have the name.
Colt: Okay.
Marisha: I think I’m being followed.
Colt: What do you want to do?
Marisha: I think it might be time for me to come in.
Colt cursed. He was about to lose his best agent. But if they didn’t extract her now, she would be apprehended by Russian counterintelligence and interrogated in a basement somewhere before getting a bullet.
“We’re going to need to bring her in,” Colt said.
“Are you sure?” Weng asked.
“Yeah.”
Colt had grown so accustomed to the whining sound of the autonomous navigation vehicles in San Francisco, with their spinning LiDAR on the roof, that he didn’t notice this one at first.
The SUV came whirring down the road, looking just like all the others, but with one major difference.
The rear window had been removed, and the barrel of a fully-automatic weapon now protruded from the opening. Just below and connected to the weapon was an electro-optic scope, attached to a computer. A simple facial recognition and tracking software program had been installed. Finding its target, the weapon locked onto Marisha Stepanova’s face and began unloading its magazine.
28
Colt shuddered at the sound. The rapid popping, accompanied by the fiery spray, went on for a full fifteen seconds. Screaming hordes of pedestrians scrambled in every direction away from the carnage.
Marisha’s headless body lay on the sidewalk.
Colt, hands on his thighs, caught his breath as the car drove away and then began slowly walking forward. His ears were ringing. He could barely hear Weng’s footsteps as she ran up.
“What are you doing?” She grabbed his arm, trying to pull him away. “We need to get out of here.”
Colt shrugged her off and kept walking. Sirens in the distance. One, then many. He reached her body. His former agent’s torso was a mass of red. Colt knew he was in shock. He knew he needed to heed Weng’s pleas to leave.
Her phone.
Colt saw SANDSTONE’s phone lying on the ground, where it had fallen from her hand. He looked at the screen, which was still lit up. Her last text, typed and unsent, had a single name.
Ava Klein
“Colt, talk to me. Are you okay?” Heather Weng’s voice drifted from the driver’s seat. They were headed to the safehouse.
“I’m okay.” He knew he didn’t sound convincing.
His phone buzzed, but he didn’t pick up. “It’s Wilcox. Shit. I need to go into Pax AI.”
Weng looked at him. “Are you able to do that right now?”
“I can do it.”
Wilcox: Where are you? Call me now.
Weng typed in the navigation to get them to the Pax AI headquarters. She took the next exit to get them on course.
Colt dialed Wilcox.
He picked up on the first ring. “Where the hell are you?”
“SANDSTONE is dead.”
“I know. Are you guys all right?”
“Listen, I . . .”
“Shut up. Are you good to go? This is important.”
Colt forced himself upright. “Yes. What do you need?”
“Where are you?”
Colt glanced at the car’s navigation console. “A few minutes from Pax AI. Heading there now. There’s something I need to tell you.” He filled him in on SANDSTONE’s text with Ava’s name on it.
Wilcox cursed. “This is what I was going to talk to you about. Colt, we put a tail on Ava this morning, after our meeting. Just as a precaution. She lost them.”
Colt said, “What are you talking about, she lost them?”
“I mean she left a pair of experienced FBI counterintelligence agents scratching their heads, wondering where the hell she went.” Colt heard Wilcox sigh. “Rinaldi has been doing some digging. Our investigators found inconsistencies in her past living history. A two-year gap where she wasn’t where she says she was. You know she had dual Israeli citizenship?”
“Her mother was Israeli,” Colt replied. The beginnings of a tingling sensation formed on the back of his neck.
“Ten years ago, her official record places her in New York. We had the FBI’s New York field office look into it. She wasn’t really there. It’s just a dead paper trail. Her age would be right for being recruited into the program, too. And she has worked internationally, which they like.”
Colt’s mind was racing. “What are you saying, Ed?”
Wilcox said, “We think she is Mossad, Colt. Israeli Intelligence.”
29
Colt arrived at the Pax AI headquarters building a few minutes later. Nader was at one of the front tables interviewing a prospective new hire. Delivery men were dropping off packages, signing them in at the front desk. The normally busy downstairs was almost empty.
“Where is everyone?” Colt asked the woman at the front desk as she scanned his badge.
“The demonstration, of course. It’s an off-site event for everyone but the leadership team . . . and me. Hey, how come you aren’t there?”
Colt looked around. “Is Ava Klein in yet?”
“Sure, she’s right over there,” said the woman, pointing.
Colt turned to see Ava sitting in an open booth, a young woman sitting across from her. He walked up and waved to catch Ava’s attention. She nodded back to him, making an awkward face and mouthing the word interview. She was interviewing a potential new hire to the company.
Colt said, “I need to speak with you,” just loud enough to be heard. She held up five fingers to tell him how many minutes she’d be. “I’ll swing by your office after.” She didn’t hold eye contact for long.
Colt walked up to the second floor, passing Nader on the way. “Big day today,” said Nader.
Colt replied, “Good luck.”
He entered his office and turned on the computer. He checked his phone for any missed calls or messages but didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.
He let out a long, slow breath, allowing his face to collapse in his hands. Marisha’s corpse kept flashing through his mind. He was starting to feel guilty. What if he had moved sooner? Pulled her out sooner.
And what was the meaning of SANDSTONE’s last text? Had SANDSTONE also learned that Ava was Mossad? Was that even possible?
Colt ran through everything he knew about Ava from the time they’d met. Everything he remembered her telling him about her nationality and family. How she looked at him back then. She was young, innocent. He remembered her minimal interest in politics and government.
Was that an act? Was Colt being recruited from the start of their relationship? Was she Mossad back then? Or would they have recruited her afterward? Mossad wouldn’t use one of their own agents to seduce some random US Navy junior officer. Would they? Israel was America’s ally. Every smile. Every look. Could she really just have been seducing him that entire time?
It was years ago, he told himself. But his feelings weren’t. They were raw and open. Gushing out. He felt so stupid. So blind. But it didn’t all fit. He kept coming back to the same conclusion: there was no motive, no logic to it.
“Hey, you wanted to see me?” Ava stood in his doorway.
Colt looked up, removing his elbows from the desktop. Ava was wearing the CIA-issued shoes. She looked nervous, but there was nothing to suggest she was anything other than what she had portrayed herself to be.
“Hi.” He swallowed, his throat dry. Wilcox had instructed Colt to act normal.
“Are you okay? You look upset.” Genuine concern in her voice.
Nader was coming up the stairs. “Ava! It’s showtime! Let’s go.”
She turned back to Colt. “Wish me luck. Talk later?” Her eyes locke
d onto his. Real emotion there, like she was holding back.
Ava turned and walked away, joining Nader as they headed up to the fourth floor.
Wilcox had told him to let her go. They had made the quick decision because there wasn’t anything else they could do, given the time. Colt was instructed to let her continue with the operation as planned. Then when she left the building, the FBI would apprehend her. Quietly.
He was to wait for five minutes after she went upstairs, then take out his phone and send a text to Weng, who would activate the NSA cyber weapon built into the heels of Ava’s shoes. Wilcox’s team would have what they needed from Pax AI, and Ava could be apprehended without hurting the mission.
Colt checked his watch. Four more minutes, then he would send the text.
That was what was supposed to happen, anyway.
Ava was now hurrying down the stairs. She froze on his floor, looking in his direction. She waved frantically for him to follow, her eyes wide with fear. Colt stood, and then Ava resumed rushing down the steps.
30
Ten minutes earlier
Ava looked at the young woman across the table from her and said, “Okay, last question: why do you want to work here?”
The young woman’s eyes flickered relief. It was a softball, and the job interview was almost over.
“I want to change the world,” the girl said, like she’d practiced this answer a million times in front of the mirror. She probably had.
Ava said, “Go on. Expand.”
“AI is the future. It’s going to change everything. And this company is at the forefront of that.”
“Okay. But everyone is working on AI now. Your resume is flawless for the position you are applying for. Why here? You could work at Google or Microsoft or any other company’s top-notch artificial intelligence programs.”
The girl tilted her head. “Yeah, but come on. I mean, very few of them are doing what you guys are doing.”