The Bourne Treachery

by Brian Freeman

  “She seems to think you’ll be more motivated, based on your experience in Tallinn. Interpol is still on Lennon’s trail, but Holly wants someone from our side. Someone who can operate in the shadows. She thought of you.”

  “I don’t trust her.”

  “I know.”

  “We were betrayed in Tallinn,” Bourne said. “Lennon knew Kotov was going to be on that ferry. Someone in the CIA tipped him to the escape route.”

  “Yes, and I know you think it was Dixon Lewis.”

  “I assume Dixon is still at Holly’s side.”

  “As far as I know, yes, he is,” Nash admitted. “Look, Jason, I share your concerns, but the CIA wants Treadstone in the loop, and Holly wants you. If we have an opportunity to take down Lennon, we need to do it. We haven’t faced an assassin with this kind of sophisticated network in Europe since Carlos.”

  Bourne took another look around the park. “Why are they so sure that Lennon is active? Half the time, we don’t even know he was involved in a hit until months later. He covers his tracks.”

  “Holly didn’t share her intel. For all I know, this is simply her acting with an abundance of caution. However, she seems to think this particular target will be irresistible to the Russians and they won’t want their fingerprints on it. That means using Lennon.”

  “Who’s the target?”

  “Are you familiar with Clark Cafferty?” Nash asked.

  “CEO of Right Angle Capital,” Bourne said.

  “Yes. Right Angle is one of the largest private funders of green energy projects in the world. More importantly, Cafferty is a major policy adviser to the new president and a big-time Russia hawk. He was the architect of the latest financial sanctions that were slapped on Russia in the spring. They’ve been putting the squeeze on Moscow’s dirty money, and Putin and the oligarchs don’t like it. Cafferty is giving a speech at the Naval College in Greenwich on Monday. Holly thinks Lennon has Cafferty in his sights.”

  “Monday?” Bourne said. “That’s three days from now. That’s not a lot of time.”

  “That’s why I’m here now.”

  “With all the radicals in town, the Brits will have the WTO meetings locked down tight. Why do they want me?”

  “Holly thinks Lennon can get around their security. He’s done it before. She thinks you stand a better chance of penetrating his network.”

  Bourne slid his sunglasses off his face. He turned his head and stared at Nash. The two of them went back for years, back into the time of his life that Jason had lost. They’d been colleagues, friends, and enemies at different points over the years. There were two things he knew about Nash.

  First, he was a company man. Nash followed orders and kept his doubts to himself.

  Second, Bourne knew when Nash was lying, and he was lying right now.

  “What are you not telling me?” Jason asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “A revenge hit over U.S. sanctions? Putin’s not going to risk taking out a personal friend of the president over something like that. And a speech at the WTO? Why would Lennon pick a high-profile venue like that, with all the risks involved? If he wanted Cafferty dead, he’d do it while the man’s on vacation or walking his dog. What’s going on? What is Cafferty really doing in London?”

  Nash stared across the boat pond at the statues of the Tuileries. “I’ve told you everything I know, Jason. If there’s anything else, Holly is keeping it to herself.”

  Bourne stood up from the green chair. He hadn’t said yes to the assignment, but he didn’t need to. Nash knew his man. Jason wanted another shot at Lennon, and he wouldn’t pass on the chance. “Will you be in London, too?”

  “No. Holly wants me on a mission in California.”

  “What’s in California?”

  “I don’t know yet. But you won’t be on your own in London. Holly’s planning to be there herself. When you get to town, stay at the Radisson Blu in Docklands. She’ll reach out to you there.”

  “The head of the CIA Russia team will be in London with Cafferty?”

  “Yes.”

  “Along with Dixon?”

  “I assume so.”

  “But this is just about a speech?” Bourne shook his head and put his sunglasses back on his face. He could feel alarm bells going off in his brain. “Am I really there to go after Lennon? Or am I being set up to take the fall if something goes wrong? This feels like Tallinn all over again.”

  Nash said nothing, but his silence was an admission.

  “All right, I’ll be there tomorrow morning,” Jason said. “I have to make a stop first.”

  “Where?”

  “Stockholm. There’s someone there who knows a lot more about Lennon than you or me. Or Holly, for that matter.”

  Bourne began to walk away, but the Treadstone agent called after him under his breath. “Jason.”

  “What?”

  “I meant what I said about your past,” Nash told him. “Be careful.”

  3

  The first time Jason noticed the French girl with the buzz cut was at the Châtelet station as he waited for the train to De Gaulle. She was dressed to look like a teenager, but he could tell that she was older than that. She wore a jean shirt with Antifa patches, short-shorts, and black knee boots, and she had a dirty backpack slung over one arm. The stubble on her shaved head was dyed bright yellow, and two large white hoop earrings dangled from her ears. It was the kind of outfit that encouraged you to notice everything except her face, which was why Bourne took note of the slight upward bend in the angle of her chin and the distinctive bulb shape at the tip of her nose.

  The next time he saw her was four hours later, in the cab line outside Arlanda Airport in Stockholm. The backpack was gone; so were the earrings. She’d covered up her buzz cut with a copper red wig that made her hair bushy, and she’d replaced her punk clothes with a Taylor Swift T-shirt and skinny jeans. She’d gone to considerable lengths to look like someone different, but it was definitely the same girl. Same bone structure in her chin, same bulb-shaped nose.

  He was already being followed.

  His cab dropped him at Congress Centre on the waterfront. From there, he walked to the central train station. The girl stayed a safe distance behind him. She was good, but not good enough to realize that her cover had been blown. He booked a ticket on the next train to Uppsala, then used the crowd of passengers on the incoming train to slip away from the platform. From his vantage in the terminal, he watched the girl pace back and forth beside the train, growing increasingly agitated when she realized he’d eluded her. Finally, she slammed a fist into a column on the platform. This one had a temper that she hadn’t learned to control. Agents like that were dangerous.

  Bourne left her inside the station and returned to the Stockholm streets. He didn’t spot any more tails, but he couldn’t help but wonder: Who was she working for?

  Was Nash keeping an eye on him? Or was it Holly Schultz?

  Or did Lennon already know that Bourne was on his trail?

  He found a nondescript hotel above an Indian restaurant in the Östermalm district, and he waited until dark before venturing out again. He walked south and crossed the river at the Djurgården Bridge, staying on the sidewalk that hugged the water around the nub of the island. There were plenty of people around, but he didn’t spot the young woman again. Even so, he circled the area twice before proceeding to his final destination, which was the Vasa Museum. The building was closed and dark, but he made his way to the staff entrance at the back and waited until there was a break among the tourists near the water to pick the lock.

  Inside, he proceeded down the steps into the heart of the museum. The remains of a seventeenth-century Swedish warship towered over his head like some kind of sea monster. The Vasa had foundered on its maiden voyage in 1628 and been salvaged from the mud more than th
ree centuries later. Now, with its two-hundred-foot wooden shell almost completely intact, the ship loomed in the darkness like a spectral Flying Dutchman that could sail off into the fog and never return.

  On the far side of the ship, Bourne saw a light in the secured area where the museum’s scientists did their research. He knew that Gunnar Eriksson always worked late. Quietly, Bourne made his way to the locked gate, but when he got there, he found the area empty. A chair was pushed back, steam rose from a mug of tea, and the man’s computer screen hadn’t gone to sleep yet. Gunnar had left only moments earlier.

  He’d seen Bourne coming.

  Jason turned around slowly and called out to the darkness around the old warship. “It’s me, Gunnar. Cain.”

  Seconds later, a Swedish-accented voice spoke from the shadows. “Well, well. So the rumors are true. You’re back.”

  A thin blond man in his forties walked under the chocolate-colored planks of the Vasa. His footsteps echoed in the empty space. He wore a white lab coat over a pale green infantry sweater and jeans. His hair was greasy, parted in the middle, and he had a long face with bags under his blue eyes. His spotty beard looked as if it had never fully grown in. He had a gun in his hand, but when he saw Bourne, he holstered it behind his back.

  “One can never be too careful,” Gunnar said. “I didn’t recognize you on the camera feed.”

  “Sorry for the surprise visit.”

  “No, no, it’s fine. I miss our midnight talks. You, me, and Nova solving all the problems of the world. Do you want some tea?”

  “No, thanks.”

  “Well, come on back. Tell me what you need.”

  Bourne followed Gunnar into the research area, where the scientist took a seat and eyed Bourne from over his mug of tea. Gunnar was an anthropologist who’d spent the last twenty years analyzing artifacts from the Vasa in order to piece together a picture of Swedish life in the seventeenth century. He also had a sideline job that few people knew about. Interpol regularly came to him to predict behavioral patterns in high-profile terrorist networks. He based his profiles on the smallest details, from the brand of shoes the assailants wore to the cars they drove to the music they streamed. His record was uncannily accurate. He’d once suggested that Interpol and the FBI stake out a Krispy Kreme doughnut store in Ireland to catch a fleeing American white supremacist, after discovering that the man had lived near a Krispy Kreme shop when he was ten years old in Alabama. The skinhead showed up at the Dublin store three days later when the hot doughnuts now light went on and was immediately arrested.

  “Shall I put on some music?” Gunnar asked, with a dance of his eyebrows. “Maybe something from Sgt. Pepper or Rubber Soul?”

  Bourne smiled tightly. “So you know why I’m here.”

  “Lennon.”

  “That’s right. I assume Interpol has used you in their investigation.”

  “Yes, of course,” Gunnar replied. “As they get more information about him, they keep feeding me details, and I tell them what I can. So far, I’m sorry to say, it hasn’t gotten us any closer to finding him.”

  “Why is that?” Bourne asked. “How does he stay one step ahead of you?”

  Gunnar rocked back in the chair and propped his dusty leather shoes on his desk. “Oh, many reasons. First, on a personal level, no one really knows what he looks like. The man sheds disguises like a snake. He leaves no witnesses behind, and on those rare occasions when we’ve captured people in his network, they’ve given us contradictory descriptions. His eyes are blue. No, they’re green. No, they’re brown. He has blond hair, or is it black? His chin has a dimple, and his nose is long, except wait, his chin is flat and he has rather a broad nose. The only thing people seem to agree on is that he’s tall, but we’re not even sure exactly how tall. Could be six foot, could be six-foot-five or anywhere in between.”

  “What else?” Bourne asked.

  “Well, he’s exceedingly cautious. Like the ISIS leaders, he never sleeps in the same bed twice and rarely carries a phone, so he can’t be tracked. He runs his operation like the gig economy, using freelancers who are largely disconnected from each other. That way, if we capture one, he can’t give up anyone else. Also, the man is a master at leveraging people. He finds weaknesses, whether it’s money, sex, family, anything that can be exploited to turn someone into an asset. As a result, he has moles in all of the intelligence services. The chances are he already knows you’re coming after him. My advice would be to trust no one.”

  “I found that out in Tallinn,” Bourne said.

  “Indeed.”

  Bourne shook his head. “Who is he, Gunnar? Everyone talks about Lennon, but no one seems to know where he came from. At least with Carlos, we were able to cull out details about his background. He had family, an ideology, a story. He was a real person.”

  “I wish I could tell you more,” Gunnar replied, “but much like his physical appearance, Lennon’s background is shrouded in mystery. No one seems to know the truth. He’s young, we think. Probably no older than you, Cain, so put him in his mid-thirties. He came on the scene very suddenly a few years ago, which suggests that he left some other identity behind him. But we have no idea who he was. He has close Russian connections, but his refined habits have always convinced me that he was raised in Europe. There have been rumors that he’s the illegitimate son of one of the oligarchs. Some people even claim he’s Putin’s own son, which would explain his fierce loyalty to him. I don’t happen to believe that, but who knows? The main thing is, he’s smart and ruthless. He’s just as willing to torture one individual as he is to blow up fifty people on a ferry boat. He’s also enjoying himself, which in my mind makes him particularly dangerous. This isn’t just a job to him. He’s having a hell of a good time.”

  “What makes you say that?”

  “Well, the irony with the name, for one thing. Lenin and Lennon. Not to mention the music. He’s playing with us. He sees the chase as a game, too. I learned that lesson myself. There aren’t many people who know the work I do for Interpol. It’s all under a pseudonym, completely anonymous. Regardless, not long after I did my first profile of Lennon, I got a little package in the mail at my home address. It was the holiday season. Inside, I found a selection of charcuterie from my favorite deli, along with a 45 single of John Lennon singing ‘Happy Xmas.’ He wanted me to realize that he knew who I was, he knew my routines, and he could eliminate me anytime he wanted. And yet it wasn’t simply a threat. It was a joke, too.”

  Bourne frowned.

  The most dangerous opponent is the one who’s unpredictable. Treadstone.

  “The CIA think he’s planning a job in London,” Jason said.

  “I’ve heard the same thing. Clark Cafferty.”

  “That’s right. If Lennon’s in London, how do we find him? He’s not likely to show himself until it’s too late.”

  “True. However.”

  Bourne heard the change in Gunnar’s voice, as if the man were mulling an interesting new artifact from the Swedish warship. “You have an idea?”

  “Well, this is an opportunity we’ve never had. Advance knowledge of a target, even if it’s only by a few days. Perhaps you can leverage what we know about how Lennon operates.”

  “Meaning?”

  Gunnar sipped his tea. “Who did the press call out for the Tallinn attack?”

  “The rumors all named a splinter Islamic extremist group. It was months before Lennon’s name surfaced, despite the report from me and Nova.”

  “Exactly. Two years ago in Berlin, the same thing happened. A car bomb took out the deputy minister. Most of the German intelligence experts are now convinced it was Lennon, but for months the evidence pointed to a neo-Nazi group protesting immigration policy. You see, Lennon may have an ego, but he doesn’t need adulation the way Carlos did, the articles in the New York Times, the thrillers written about him. He feels no need
to take credit for his kills. Instead, he uses extremist groups to give him cover, and by the time we figure out that he was involved, the trail is cold.”

  “So you think he’s likely to do the same thing in London?” Bourne asked.

  Gunnar shrugged. “Well, talk about a target-rich environment. Every WTO meeting seethes with radical threats. The protests and riots are a who’s who of left-wing causes. Lennon wouldn’t find it difficult to plant a false flag if there’s an assassination.”

  “So follow the extremists,” Bourne said.

  “That’s my advice.”

  “Three days isn’t much time.”

  “That’s true, but Lennon is in the same situation you are. Nobody knew Cafferty was attending the WTO until very recently, so Lennon didn’t have months to plan. If you’re lucky, he’s scrambling to catch up just like us. In the process, he may be leaving a trail you can follow.”

  “What kind of trail?” Bourne asked.

  “I would think that’s obvious,” Gunnar replied. “Dead bodies.”

  4

  The pub known as the Lonely Shepherd was located in Bloomsbury near the Russell Square underground station. Vadik made his way there a few minutes before ten o’clock on Friday evening. He’d been careful about his route, taking a bus in the opposite direction from Green Park and then transferring to two different Tube lines to avoid being followed. Even so, he felt twitchy as he headed down the narrow street. This was London, and there were CCTV cameras everywhere.

  Vadik passed the pub without stopping or slowing down. He noted graffiti-covered plywood boards that had been nailed over the windows and a handwritten sign on the door: closed by the riots, so piss off. He continued to the end of the street, where he lit a cigarette and watched people come and go from Southampton Row. He kept checking his watch, and at ten o’clock sharp, he retraced his steps and knocked sharply on the locked door.

  A tall, thirtysomething Brit with shaggy dreadlocks opened it. He had the look of a bouncer. “Closed, mate. Learn to read.”