The Bourne Treachery

by Brian Freeman

  “You can say his name, you know,” he told her.

  “What do you mean?”

  “There was a killing in the Greenwich tunnel yesterday. A hired thug was shot. No ID. Naturally, when that happens, the police start checking CCTV feeds on both sides of the river. When the facial recognition turns up an Interpol agent in the area, guess whose desk it lands on?”

  Nova didn’t use any fake denials. They wouldn’t work on Anthony. “I didn’t have time for police bureaucracy.”

  “I’m not questioning that. What I’m saying is that you weren’t alone in the photograph from the CCTV feed. You can say his name, Nova. You can admit that he’s back in your life. Jason Bourne.”

  9

  “That’s him,” Bourne murmured into the radio.

  He watched their target walk down the steps of a four-story apartment building in a Bloomsbury crescent known as Cartwright Gardens. The man was small, only about five-foot-six, in his mid-twenties. He had a boy band mop of brown hair, ragged eyebrows, and a pimply face that needed a shave. Most of the buttons on his white shirt were undone, and he wore no T-shirt underneath. His rose-colored slacks fit tightly.

  His face matched the photograph that MI-5 had supplied of Ethan Pople, manager of the Lonely Shepherd pub.

  “He’s heading your way,” Bourne said.

  “Got him,” Nova replied.

  As Ethan walked, his fingers flew on his phone. He followed the crescent past a series of cheap hotels and turned right on Marchmont, which led toward the Russell Square Tube station and the Lonely Shepherd. Nova stayed two blocks ahead of him, not looking back. A camera sticking out of the pocket of her jeans fed a live stream to Bourne, who followed the two of them at a distance.

  It was a busy, narrow street filled with newsagents, laundries, charity shops, and outdoor restaurants. Low brick buildings faced each other, and a few trees grew out of plots in the sidewalks. The people who came and went were part of the typical London melting pot, young and old, stuffy and punk, English, Indian, and Middle Eastern. Bourne kept a close eye on Ethan, but he didn’t see the man interact with anyone along the route. There was no sign of messages being exchanged or contacts made.

  Ahead of him, Ethan went inside a small Costa Coffee. A few seconds later, Bourne caught up with him and entered the shop, too. He stood in the queue immediately behind Ethan, who was playing a game on his phone called Holedown. The pub manager didn’t look up from the game until he got to the front of the queue a few minutes later and ordered a honeycomb latte macchiato to take away.

  When the man behind the counter asked his name, Ethan said, “Peregrine.”

  The barista made the tiniest flinch. He rang up the order, and Ethan dropped his change into the tip jar. Jason got to the counter a few seconds later, ordered a double espresso for himself, and took up position directly behind the pub manager again. When Ethan’s drink was ready, the man grabbed the red cup and spun it around to study the name scribbled in tiny print on the lip.

  Bourne squeezed close enough to read it, too. Not Ethan. Not Peregrine.

  Tom Hanks.

  The surprise stopped Jason for a split second, which was enough that he reacted slowly when Ethan looked up from his coffee. Their eyes met.

  “Sorry,” Bourne murmured.

  He sidestepped the man to retrieve his espresso. He didn’t look at Ethan again. Instead, he took a seat at one of the tables and took out his phone and sipped his drink. Without looking, he was aware that Ethan Pople stood frozen in the middle of the coffee shop, watching to see what Bourne did. Then the man walked quickly out to the street. Bourne could feel the heat of the man’s eyes checking to see if he was going to follow.

  “He made me,” Jason murmured.

  In the receiver in his ear, Nova replied, “I see him.”

  “Give him space.”

  “Yeah. He’s suspicious now.”

  Bourne unbuttoned the dark dress shirt he was wearing and slipped it off. Underneath, he wore a white T-shirt decorated with a Japanese painting. He untucked the shirt to let it hang casually, then reached for his back pocket and took out a crumpled khaki bucket hat and put it on his head. He covered his eyes with sunglasses. He headed for the street and dropped the dress shirt in the trash.

  “I’m crossing the street,” Bourne said.

  “He’s passing the Holiday Inn. I’ll get ahead of him.”

  Bourne crossed to the opposite side of Marchmont and saw Nova’s jet-black hair farther down the block. He kept pace with a couple of university students on the sidewalk, so that anyone watching would think he was with them. From behind his sunglasses, he saw Nova move ahead of Ethan without a glance in his direction. Ethan definitely looked nervous now. He kept stopping to look back, but he didn’t notice Bourne two blocks away.

  At the end of the street was the red stone façade of the Russell Square Tube station. Ethan headed through the zebra crossing toward the station but didn’t go into the underground. He also didn’t continue to the side street that led to the Lonely Shepherd. He simply stopped outside the station and checked his phone.

  “Where are you?” Bourne whispered to Nova.

  “Near the pub. Is he coming my way?”

  “No, he’s not moving.”

  “Should I head back there?”

  “Hang on.”

  Bourne didn’t like it.

  Ethan stayed where he was, not looking up or studying the faces around him. Jason recognized a tenseness in the man’s body now. A twitch in his legs. A tremble in his hand holding his phone.

  “He’s going to run.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yeah, he knows we’re onto him.”

  “I’m on my way.”

  Ethan’s eyes glanced up to survey the street. It was meant to be subtle, but it wasn’t. Left. Right. And then right at Bourne. Eye to eye. When the man saw him, his gaze stopped in confusion. It took him a moment to penetrate Jason’s new disguise, but then his eyes widened, and his mouth dropped open.

  “Shit,” Bourne said.

  The pub manager dropped his coffee cup and charged inside the Russell Square lobby. Bourne ran, too. He zigzagged through traffic and shoved into the crowded heart of the station. He jumped the ticket turnstile, where there was a huge line-up for the lifts down to the trains. Ethan Pople wasn’t in the crowd. Bourne shouldered his way to the stairs, and below him, he heard the rapid pounding of footsteps. He took the steps, which wound back and forth in a tight spiral. It was a long way down. When Bourne got to the bottom, he heard the rumble of a train accelerating away from one of the platforms and felt a rush of air whipping into his face from the train tunnel.

  Next to him, thirty or forty people waited for the lifts back to the top. He stopped to make sure Ethan hadn’t taken cover among them, but the man wasn’t there. The pub manager was on one of the platforms, either eastbound or westbound.

  “What’s your status?” he murmured to Nova. “Where are you?”

  Deep in the hole of the Underground, his radio didn’t work.

  East or west?

  Bourne took the steps to the eastbound platform. When he got there, he saw the black train tunnel looming beside him and noticed a rat scampering between the rails. The air was still and cool. Billboards stretched along the curved walls. The walkway was dotted with dozens of people waiting for the next train.

  On the sign overhead, he saw that the train for Cockfosters was two minutes away. Bourne slowly weaved his way among the passengers. Second by second, others arrived, hurrying past him to take up positions along the platform like chess pieces.

  Where is he?

  Bourne heard a distant thunder and felt vibration under his feet. A train was arriving on the other side of the station. If Ethan had chosen the westbound platform, he would be gone in seconds.

  No. There!
>
  Ethan Pople was crouched on the balls of his feet, pressed against the white-tiled wall. He stared between his knees, but he felt Bourne’s presence and glanced up and saw him. Like a shot, Ethan leaped to his feet. Bourne closed on him step by step, and Ethan backed away, but he had nowhere to go. He was already near the end of the platform and the dark mouth of the tunnel.

  Then a young woman with a backpack walked by Bourne.

  She had headphones on, oblivious to what was going on around her. She headed for a spot where she could board the first train car, and Ethan attacked her immediately. With a blow to her shoulder, he sent her flying onto the train tracks, and simultaneously he charged, pushing two people into Bourne and knocking him backward.

  Screams filled the station. Jason heard the growing throb of the train, and bright headlights appeared beyond the curve. He let Ethan go and jumped into the coal-black pit of the tunnel, where he grabbed the young woman and hoisted her back to the safety of the platform. As a tornado of air blew into his face, he leaped and rolled away from the tracks himself just as the first train car rocketed out of the tunnel.

  Scrambling to his feet, Bourne ran along the platform. He had to shove people aside as the doors opened and crowds poured from the train. Ethan had already disappeared. Bourne dodged people up the steps to the lifts and got there just as the doors closed. The pub manager was inside, grinning as the elevator shut with Bourne on the other side. Jason swore, then took the punishing stairs upward. The deep shaft made for a long climb, and by the time he made it to the top, the lift had already emptied people into the station.

  Ethan was nearly to the street.

  The man looked over his shoulder and saw Bourne. He didn’t see Nova, who was waiting outside.

  As Ethan reached the sidewalk, Nova bent the man’s arm behind his back and shoved him into the wall. Jason joined her, and the two of them hustled Ethan down the block to the Lonely Shepherd. Bourne dug in the man’s pocket and found his keys.

  “Open the door.”

  Ethan squirmed, but Nova bent his wrist back hard. The man turned the key in the lock and let them inside. The three of them went into the dark pub, and Bourne searched him as Nova shut the door.

  “Where’s your phone?” he asked.

  “Fuck you.”

  Bourne patted him down. “He must have ditched it. Tell me about the coffee cup, the fake names. Tom Hanks.”

  “It’s a joke. The barista knows me.”

  “What about the Gaia Crusade?”

  “I’ve never heard of them.”

  “Yeah? Word is, the London cell meets in the pub.”

  “A lot of people meet here.”

  “Why did you run?”

  Ethan shrugged. “Someone’s following me, I run.”

  Nova slapped the man across the face. “Wake up! Do you want to end up like one of your bartenders? They pulled him out of the Thames yesterday.”

  The man’s eyes widened with surprise. “Trevor? No way. You’re lying.”

  Nova opened her phone and retrieved a photo that Anthony Audley had sent her. “Does that look like I’m lying?”

  Ethan paled. “Holy fuck.”

  “They also found a newsagent in Hackney who had his throat slit and his arm cut off at the elbow. We think he was tied to the Crusade, too.”

  “His arm? Oh, my God!”

  Bourne pinched the man’s windpipe between his fingers. “Your operation has been penetrated, Ethan. You’re being set up. Anyone who gets in the way gets killed. Talk to us, or you’re next.”

  Ethan choked out his words. “What do you want? Jesus, what do you want?”

  “The bartender. Why was he killed?”

  “I don’t know, man! Trevor wasn’t part of anything! He opened the pub, he poured drinks, that’s all. I told him it was an illegal gambling thing. I paid him a hundred quid to stay quiet.”

  “When was this?” Nova asked.

  “There was a meeting Friday night. Ten o’clock.”

  “The Crusade?”

  “Yeah. They were meeting someone. An outsider.”

  “An outsider? Who?”

  “I don’t know. I give them a meeting place, I keep my mouth shut, that’s all. I swear!”

  Ethan was sweating. And lying.

  “You’re holding out on us,” Bourne said, squeezing the man’s throat again. “Who was the meeting with?”

  The pub manager gagged. “I told you, I don’t know!”

  “What was it about?”

  Bourne dug in his fingers again as Ethan hesitated.

  “All right, all right, a hit! A hit! We’re taking someone down at the WTO.”

  “What’s the plan?” Bourne asked. “When, where, who’s involved. How are you going to take out Cafferty?”

  “Who?”

  “Cafferty,” Bourne said again.

  “I don’t know who that is. I swear, I don’t. The target’s a Russian. One of the fucking billionaire oil men. He’s coming into town tonight.”

  “What’s his name?”

  “Sorokin,” Ethan gasped. “Gennady Sorokin.”

  10

  Sugar barked once to announce Bourne’s arrival.

  Jason watched Holly Schultz expertly cross the hotel room to greet him. Had she been sighted, she would have had a photographic memory. Instead, he’d discovered when he first met her that her brain allowed her to picture the layout of any room with no more than a single tour around it. She also had Sugar to alert her if something had changed.

  “Cain,” she said. “Welcome.”

  “Holly.”

  She hadn’t changed much in the three years since he’d seen her in Tallinn. There was a little more gray in her short dark hair, but otherwise, the birdlike CIA analyst looked the same. Behind her, Dixon Lewis, who was always as close to Holly as her shadow, perused papers at a conference table on the other side of the hotel room. When Dixon saw Bourne, he shut and locked the papers inside a briefcase.

  “Did Cafferty arrive in London?” Jason asked.

  “Yes, he got here this morning,” Holly replied. “Most of today’s meetings are taking place in his suite. Dixon doesn’t see any threats of significance until the meeting at the Naval College tomorrow. Do you agree?”

  Bourne nodded. “The speech is the obvious hole in the security plan. You ought to think about canceling. Or at least you shouldn’t let him mingle with the crowd.”

  Holly shifted to the sofa and sat down, and Sugar followed and took up position beside her. “Clark is adamant that we do no such thing. His relationships with the delegates and scientists at the WTO are too important, and he’s not willing to live and work inside a bubble. It’s our job to keep him safe. What have you discovered so far? Have you confirmed that Lennon is in London?”

  “All the signs tell us he is. One of his operatives followed me at the Naval College yesterday. He knows I’m in town, he knows I’m hunting him, but that’s not likely to dissuade him from whatever he’s planning. We also think that he’s been gathering intelligence on an extremist group called the Gaia Crusade.”

  “I’m familiar with the Gaia Crusade,” Holly replied with a frown, “but I don’t see them as a risk for getting close to Clark. They’re street thugs, not sophisticated assassins like Lennon.”

  “Cafferty’s not their target,” Bourne replied.

  “Oh? Who is?”

  “A Russian oligarch making a secret visit to London. Gennady Sorokin.”

  He watched for a reaction, and he got it. Dixon’s head swung around with surprise at the mention of Sorokin’s name. Holly’s eyes were hidden behind her dark glasses, but she tilted up her chin and idly stroked Sugar’s head, a gesture that told Jason she was thinking through an entirely new threat. They hadn’t expected Sorokin’s name to enter the conversation, which meant they kn
ew perfectly well that he was coming to London.

  “You’re sure?” Holly asked. “What’s your source?”

  “Someone inside the Gaia Crusade. He’s in the hands of MI-5 now. They’re trying to get more out of him.”

  “Do you know what they’re planning?”

  “I don’t, but I’m guessing from your reaction that Cafferty is meeting Sorokin tomorrow. The fact that Sorokin is leaving Russia at all, given the indictments against him, means you’ve got something big planned. Something worth the risk on both sides. Well, the Gaia Crusade knows he’s coming, and that means Lennon does, too.”

  Dixon came over and stood eye to eye with Bourne. The black agent was dressed in a suit that looked straight out of Savile Row. His shoes were shined to a blinding finish. The man obviously thought of himself as a kind of James Bond, with the ego and arrogance to go along with it. He had close-cropped dark hair, a muscular build, and a cocky little smile that let you know he was the smartest man in any room.

  “You’re right about Sorokin,” Dixon acknowledged. “He’s meeting Cafferty.”

  “Why? About what?”

  “Sorry, that’s classified.”

  “Do you think that matters?” Bourne replied. “The fact that they’re meeting at all makes Sorokin a marked man. Lennon will be looking to take out both of them. Probably at the meeting.”

  “Let us worry about the meeting.”

  Bourne laughed with no humor. “Because you’ve got everything under control? Like in Tallinn?”

  Dixon’s whole body stiffened. “Tallinn was regrettable.”

  “Is that what you call it? Fifty people died. Including Kotov.”

  “I’m well aware of the consequences.”

  Holly tapped her cane sharply on the table in front of her. “Both of you, let’s keep our focus on the immediate threat. Lennon is the real danger here. Jason, do you have any information that will help us find him?”

  “Not yet. I’d like the profiles on everyone who has clearance to attend the speech tomorrow. Photos, backgrounds, etc. We should assume Lennon’s on the list somewhere. Either he’s got a false identity already established, or he’s going to take the place of a real delegate. We need to figure out who before he gets anywhere near Cafferty.”