The Paris Diversion

by Chris Pavone

  “Anyone unusual at all?”

  “Ah…non.”

  Or maybe there’s no truth whatsoever to this cockamamie-sounding explanation.

  The line is silent for a few seconds, while the two 4Syte employees try to figure out what each should do next.

  “We have to loop in legal, don’t we?”

  * * *

  Kate wasn’t going to answer his knock. Peter knew, obviously, that she was in the hotel room. She couldn’t pretend that she wasn’t there, nor that she was asleep, nor that she didn’t hear it, nor that she couldn’t get to the door. She was just going to not answer.

  That’s what she should have done; that’s what she tried to do.

  She failed.

  Kate rose from the bed. She crossed the room. She leaned against the door, put her hand on the knob, debating, wavering…

  She opened the door.

  Peter didn’t look surprised, not even relieved, it was simply what he expected. He glanced at her disarrayed blouse, her mussed-up hair, her smeared lipstick. He could see it all, the past five minutes; he could smell it.

  She didn’t say anything. Neither did he.

  He leaned toward her, and she couldn’t stop it, wouldn’t, his tongue was in her mouth and hers in his, and he leaned into her, she could feel him firm against her thigh, and she grew hot again, he was pressing against her harder, and then his hand was on her leg, he had snuck up her skirt, and she felt a finger slip inside, they were standing in the hallway, and she thought, no, we can’t do this here, not in public like this, and then she thought—no!—it’s not the location that’s the problem, you idiot, it’s the whole thing, you can’t do this—

  “I can’t.” She pushed down her skirt, expelling his fingers, his hand. “I’m sorry.”

  * * *

  How long were they kissing? A minute? Two?

  She kept trying to give herself over to it completely, but all these other scenes came rushing at her like a collage, the stolen afternoons in out-of-the-way hotels, and the coded messages on encrypted apps, and secretly holding hands under restaurant tables, kissing in elevators and tears in taxis and ignored phone calls, cover stories about the account being hacked, No I don’t know who that is…

  Kate could see it all so clearly. Even though she’d never done it, and never will.

  * * *

  She left Seville the next day. It was a few weeks before Kate and Peter had an opportunity to be alone, truly alone, with a chance to discuss what had happened. What hadn’t happened. Kate wondered if they ever would get around to talking about it, or if instead it would hang there undiscussed, uncommented upon, a sexual sword of Damocles, ready in perpetuity to fall.

  Then Palermo put them in a car together, alone. They arrived two hours before the meet, to ensure that no one could get the drop, also to give them—to give Kate—plenty of time to vocalize her myriad objections. Saying them aloud made the reasons more real, transformed the solo ideas into a shared reality, this discussion building a consensus, a bulwark for a state of no-ness. Though it wasn’t a discussion so much as a monologue.

  “This is not a rejection of you,” she said.

  “I don’t think I could live with myself,” she said.

  “I couldn’t have you working for me,” she said.

  “I don’t think I’d be able to talk to you ever again, or even to see you,” she said.

  “I couldn’t do that to my husband,” she said.

  “I’ve already done too many things that were wrong,” she said.

  “That’s not the person I want to be,” she said.

  “I don’t think I could live with myself,” she said again.

  She had a lot of reasons. Some were so compelling she counted them twice.

  “I know that this is the right path for us,” she concluded. “You see that, don’t you?”

  “I do,” he said. “You’re completely right. About all of it.”

  And she chose to believe him, although she knew he was lying. Because so was she.

  * * *

  It’s impossible to be certain that she didn’t put Peter in harm’s way purposefully. Maybe, subconsciously, she wanted to prove that she wasn’t playing favorites. That this man was not her lover, just another operative, expendable, no special treatment.

  Maybe it was worse. Maybe she actively hoped for something bad, something that would remove this temptation, would bury this secret forever, from everyone.

  She was parked a half-block from the café where Peter would meet the asset. It was a busy street, mid-afternoon, broad daylight, plenty of witnesses. There was even a policeman at the far end of the block, staring at his phone. A safe environment.

  The first thing that happened was a beat-up Skoda double-parked next to her, trapping her. The driver killed the ignition and jumped out.

  “Hey!” she called, but the man ran across the street, into a shop.

  Not only couldn’t she pull the car out of the spot, she couldn’t even open her door.

  This could’ve been benign, but Kate knew it wasn’t.

  She strained her neck to see through the sidewalk crowd. Peter was in front of the café now, about to turn, but then there was fast movement from a minivan parked at the curb, its door flew open and a man emerged, and Peter turned to confront this potential menace, unaware that another man was closing in rapidly from the other direction—

  “Fuck,” Kate muttered, trying to climb over the gear shaft, into the passenger seat—

  * * *

  What is a thought? An infinitesimally small electrical charge jumping among synapses in the brain’s frontal lobe. What the hell is that? Plenty of these electrical charges were hopping around Kate’s brain in the space of the second it took for her to cross to the other side of the car. Intervention scenarios, rescues, shootouts on the streets of Palermo.

  Plus this: maybe it’s not such a bad thing, for me—for my marriage, for my life—if Peter disappears forever.

  * * *

  —and she reached for the door handle while this second man shoved Peter from the side, knocking him off-balance, allowing the first man to easily grab Peter from beside the van’s door, and these were both big men, Kate could see they were businesslike and calm, these weren’t panicked irrational hotheads, these were professionals, and it took at most two seconds before the door slid closed and the van was pulling away, while the policeman was still staring at his phone, and Kate had never even gotten herself out of the car.

  This is what haunts her the most. Not the things she did, but this thing she didn’t, this inaction. This shot she didn’t take. This life she didn’t save.

  * * *

  What does deserve mean? Who does the measuring, the meting out? What does Kate’s scorecard look like?

  What is she? She’s a woman who has killed people, and at least one of them was innocent. She has ruined lives because it was her job. She has destroyed marriages, she has taken husbands from wives, parents from children, money and security and peace-of-mind from dozens of people. All over the world there are people who can’t sleep at night because of what Kate did. Because someone told her to, and she didn’t say no.

  Has she been a good worker, using her employer’s resources for her own agenda? A good parent, actively choosing not to stay home with her children, perhaps even putting them in peril because of her professional choices? A good wife, standing in a hotel hall, another man’s fingers bringing her to the brink?

  Kate had stayed in Seville for too long—longer than had strictly been necessary. By the time she came home to Paris on a Sunday night, Ben had fallen sick again, his medications run out. She hadn’t been around to prevent it.

  She took her little boy straightaway to the hospital, and sat there in the waiting room, wondering: what does a person like Kate Moore deserve?

  * * *

>   Kate shifts the phone to her other ear. She has noticed that her hearing is no longer as strong in one ear, but sometimes she forgets which. A double-whammy of hearing loss exacerbated by memory loss. It’s humiliating, and no one even knows about it. She almost told Dexter, but something held her back.

  She wishes some doctor would present her with a chart, or a timeline: which bodily functions she can expect to fail, with what speed and level of discomfort and inconvenience, beginning when, lasting for what duration, and ending with what level of incapacitation.

  “Sans doute, we must cancel the press conference, Schuyler.” This is a new call that Schuyler is on, with the lawyer.

  Eyesight, hearing, knees, lower back, libido, hips, hair loss, menopause, breast cancer. It’s all just a matter of time, isn’t it?

  “We cannot have la presse here and Monsieur Forsyth does not arrive. Even if it would be possible to keep the fact of his disappearance secret—which I do not think would be possible—it would still be a large problem to cancel when reporters are here, asking their questions, with their recording devices.”

  “Agreed, Aurélie.”

  “We must inform the board of directors, immédiatement.” The woman sighs. “Mon Dieu.”

  There are legal ramifications to a situation like this, a missing CEO during a terrorism event. Responsibilities that employees have to their boards, to shareholders, perhaps to police, to other authorities.

  “When the stock market opens in New York—”

  The ramifications are immense, for 4Syte’s employees, its investors, shareholders.

  “—ça sera une catastrophe.”

  Yes, it certainly will be a catastrophe.

  But that’s when Kate realizes: not for everyone.

  She has to get the hell out of here—

  43

  PARIS. 1:15 P.M.

  Think, Hunter tells himself: is it possible that the CIA would use a phone that had been manufactured in China, embedded with who knows what hidden technologies, or compromised microchips, or surreptitious recording mechanisms, or remote-activation triggers, or fiber-optic splices?

  It seems so unlikely. But that’s not the same as impossible.

  He looks around at the curtains that hide the boarded-up windows, at the triple-locked door, at the American sitting at the small dining table, leafing through a newspaper. The guy looks like he knows his way around a fistfight. That cheap hopsack suit isn’t hiding a spare-tire belly, his hands look like they’ve never met a manicure.

  Think this through again.

  Okay, yes: it does make sense that a CIA babysitter wouldn’t allow a man like Hunter Forsyth to walk out this door, into a dangerous environment, when the Agency has been tasked with keeping him safe. If something awful happened, the babysitter would lose his job. Maybe end up investigated by the Senate, his own Benghazi, a public outcry, talk-show humiliations, criminal charges.

  But what could be the excuse for detaining Colette? She’s not a kidnapping target. Sure, the CIA would be worried about her blowing the location, but how important is that? Couldn’t they just shut down this safehouse? Or hustle Colette out the same way they hustled her in?

  She shouldn’t be here. Hunter shouldn’t have insisted that she come, that was selfish of him, greedy. He put her in harm’s way.

  But then again, he can’t help thinking: Colette makes it two against one.

  And: Hunter will have the element of surprise on his side.

  And: Hunter is a strong man, he’s fit, he has fast reflexes. Plus he knows how to throw a punch. Or at least he did, twenty years ago. Twenty-five.

  And: maybe Colette can be useful, at the very least a distraction. She sure as hell distracts Hunter. She could distract any man, couldn’t she?

  But, on the other hand: Simpson is probably armed, and the cops outside too.

  But, without a doubt: Simpson is trained in hand-to-hand combat.

  But: if the CIA wouldn’t buy a Chinese-made phone, that means that Simpson is not CIA, so what the fuck is he?

  Every answer is more terrifying than the last, all variations on the same theme: Hunter has not really been taken under the protective embrace of an American diplomat or intelligence officer.

  Hunter’s pulse is racing, brain growing fuzzy with increasing panic.

  What has happened to him is something much less outlandish, much more predictable, a contingency that he has foreseen, for which he has planned. His security chief, his international bodyguard teams, the motion-detector alarms, the armored cars, the whole thing, hundreds of thousands of dollars per year that Hunter Forsyth spends to try to prevent this very thing from happening.

  He’s almost sure of it now. Because he just realized what it was that was bothering him three hours ago, when they first arrived at this ostensible safe-house: how the fuck did Simpson get its keys?

  44

  PARIS. 1:24 P.M.

  “Madame?”

  Kate pretends to be startled. “Oui?”

  “I am directeur of communications. Can I be of some assistance?”

  “I’m waiting for Schuyler Franks.”

  “Oui. And you are who, please?”

  “My name is Lindsay Davis.” Behind Kate, in the hall, the elevator door dings. She should’ve left already, when it was easy. Now it’s going to be harder.

  “Please, what is it you are doing here?”

  “I told you, I’m—”

  “Yes, mais pourquoi? Why, Madame, are you here to see Schuyler Franks? Why?”

  Kate can feel the air pressure change as the glass door is opened. She doesn’t need to look over her shoulder to know who has arrived. “It’s personal.”

  “Sandrine?” The woman cuts her eyes toward the receptionist. “Appelle la police.”

  “I’m sorry.” Kate turns toward the door, which a security guard is now blocking. “There must be some confusion.”

  The guard takes a lumbering step forward, asserting his presence. He’s a big guy, but not a hard-looking one. He’s big and soft and slow moving, the type of large animal that looks a lot like prey to a smaller, agile, more vicious species.

  “Perhaps I should leave,” Kate says, smiling at the guard. He doesn’t smile back. She reaches down to collect her bag, filled with sunglasses and wallet and lipstick and keys, and this box of Lego, and a packet of the biscuits that Ben likes, because you never know.

  The guard is holding a walkie-talkie in one hand, a phone in the other, neither hand anywhere near his holster, both engaged in something that’s not protecting himself. Maybe he’s too dim-witted to think Kate could be a threat, or too dim-witted to do anything about it. Either way, his wits are not luminous. Kate feels sorry for him. It’s possible that she really does have an enemy out there, intent on doing her and her family grievous harm, but this security guard isn’t him. Or her.

  “Please tell Mademoiselle Franks that I’ll return when it’s more convenient.”

  Kate can’t allow herself to be detained by this rent-a-cop, to be questioned by the genuine police. She has a cover story, of course, a legend that will stand up to casual questioning, a set of rehearsed answers that paint a perfectly credible picture, as long as there’s no compelling reason to believe otherwise, no conflicting evidence. But if the police and intelligence coordinate on a deep-dive into her life? Dexter’s? On a matter of terrorism? Her legend might be able to withstand that level of scrutiny, but her husband would not be able to withstand that sort of interrogation.

  Kate takes another step toward the guard, slowly, nonthreatening, continuing to wear a placid smile.

  What at first looked like a holster is on second glance just a tool belt. A place to hang a walkie-talkie, a flashlight, a nylon pouch that holds whatever, but not a gun. Probably snacks. He’s a potbellied man who seems to push out his stomach purposefully,
accentuating his roundness, proclaiming, That’s right, I’m fat. What’s it to you?

  And she’s just a woman! The guard doesn’t sense any challenge here, he’s a big man in uniform, an authority, there’s no way that she’d—

  Kate lands her punch directly on the front of the nose, and he never even twitches a muscle to defend himself. After the fact, he now raises both hands to the pain in the middle of his face, protecting against a further onslaught of the same. But this is a counterproductive instinct, because not only does he conk himself in the middle of the forehead with his walkie-talkie, he also leaves his entire body exposed.

  She now has her choice of unmissable targets, an embarrassment of riches. But this one’s a no-brainer, the blow that she knows has zero chance of failure.

  The noise he makes is subhuman.

  The reassuring thing about perpetrating violence with your hard knee against someone’s soft crotch is that you’re in no danger of injuring yourself. Punching is risky; people break their fingers all the time. Kicking too, if you don’t know what you’re doing, an unrehearsed swift kick could land you on your own ass.

  The guard doubles over, totters, then collapses.

  Kate is coiled, her whole body tingling with tensed muscles, with adrenaline. She looms above the writhing pile of a person, ready to strike again. But it’s clear that this guy isn’t getting up anytime soon, he can barely breathe. Kate doesn’t want to kill this innocent sap by mistake, doesn’t want to send him to the hospital, doesn’t want to give the police any additional motivation to go looking for her too hard, tomorrow.

  So that’s enough.

  Kate realizes that she’s disappointed. It has been a while since she hit anyone. This felt good. She wants to do more of it.