“Kotov is alive!”
22
“Kotov is alive,” Holly told Bourne and Nova.
She dropped the bomb so casually that Jason didn’t immediately process what she’d said. He saw the same shock in Nova’s face. “Wait—what? He’s alive?”
“Yes.”
“The ferry sank. Everyone was lost.”
“Kotov was never on the ferry. Dixon smuggled him over land to Riga, and from there we put him on a plane. We’ve had him under deep cover in the U.S. for the last three years. But that cover’s about to be blown. Cafferty knows the truth, which means Lennon will know it soon, too. So the two of you need to understand the stakes.”
Bourne and Nova were quiet.
They’d searched for Tati and Vadik throughout the day, but now they sat with Holly on the steps of St. Paul’s Cathedral, their backs against one of the high Corinthian columns. Her idea, her destination. With Holly seated, Sugar explored the plaza in front of them, paying her own special homage to the statue of Queen Anne. It was already late evening. The London streets were mostly empty, except for an occasional cab or overnight bus heading along Ludgate Hill.
“Fifty people,” Nova said finally, with a kind of horrified awe.
“What?”
“Fifty innocent people died in that ferry explosion. Including three children. You let them die.”
“We had no way of knowing that would happen,” Holly replied in a chilly, dismissive tone. “Yes, it was a terrible tragedy, of course. The attack on the ferry was the first evidence we had of Lennon’s ruthlessness. His wanton disregard for life.”
Bourne inhaled the smells of the city, the river not far away, the grease and dirt on the cobblestones. It felt down-to-earth; it felt real. Not like the world he lived in. He should have been shocked by what Holly was saying, but nothing shocked him anymore. He thought about how Nova had described him when they’d reconnected.
Like you’re always waiting for the next betrayal.
He never had to wait very long.
“Don’t play us for fools, Holly,” he said. “The bomb on the ferry wasn’t unexpected. That was the plan. It was another ruse, a trick, just like today. Kotov needed to die in a very public way, so that everyone in Russia knew he was dead. If Putin suspected Kotov was still alive, he wouldn’t give up until he’d found him and killed him. So Dixon leaked the escape route. He was the one who made sure Lennon knew about it. You needed that ferry to blow up. You needed all those people to die. Their deaths were what made the lie convincing.”
Holly didn’t bother denying the accusation this time. He saw no guilt on her face. “We all do what is necessary, Cain. In our business, people die for a greater good. You’re in no position to be lecturing me. Nor are you, Nova. You’re both killers, too.”
“Except you put the blame on us,” Nova snapped. “I’ve had to deal with those rumors since I joined Interpol.”
“False accusations make the story believable,” Jason interjected. “Right, Holly? For a ruse to work, you have to keep playing the game. There has to be an investigation. There have to be suspects.”
Holly shrugged. “You need to appreciate the level of secrecy in this operation. I already told you, I can count on two hands the number of people who knew the truth about Kotov after Tallinn. We didn’t trust anyone, so we didn’t tell anyone. Hell, we didn’t even tell the president. We were afraid it would be leaked straight to Putin. This strategy has been in a total black box until now.”
“And what exactly is the strategy?” Bourne asked.
Sitting by the cathedral, Holly snapped her fingers. Sugar, who was wandering in the plaza thirty yards away, galloped up the steps and came to a stop, panting, in front of her.
“People,” Holly said.
Sugar barked twice, indicating that there were only two strangers nearby. Bourne. Nova. Holly was cautious.
Someone is always listening. Treadstone.
Holly dug in her pocket and handed the dog a treat. Then she gestured over her shoulder at the doors of the cathedral. “I first met Grigori right here at St. Paul’s nine years ago. Clark set it up. He and Kotov have known each other for decades. Kotov reached out to him after the 2012 elections in Russia. That was when Putin took over the presidency again. Everyone assumed the vote was rigged, of course. Kotov wanted to open up a secret dialogue with us. He said there was growing frustration, a desire for new leadership, but no one was ready to speak out. We began laying a groundwork in which someone would actually be willing to challenge Putin. But we knew it was going to take time. Years, in fact. And it had to be done with absolute secrecy.”
“Kotov began to feed us intelligence,” Bourne concluded.
“Yes. Having a spy among the siloviki was an incredible asset. Kotov was in the room for most of the major strategic decisions. He was at the top of the list of trusted advisers. He and Putin go back to the KGB days, when Kotov was his lieutenant. After the wall fell, Kotov did wet work around Europe that helped Putin and the oligarchs build their business empires and consolidate power. So Grigori was able to give us names, people we could leverage, political and economic plans, a trove of useful data. The hope was that we could launch a campaign to destabilize the regime and create an opening for an alternative to Putin. Leave him so weakened that he would step aside or be pushed out.”
“Pushed out,” Nova said. “By Kotov?”
“Yes. That was the idea. I’m not saying his motives were selfless. He wanted the presidency for himself, and he’d decided that Putin was never going to step down. The Moth was going to be another Soviet-era old man clinging to power until he had a heart attack in his nineties. Kotov didn’t want to wait around and miss his chance.”
“So what happened?” Bourne asked.
“Someone betrayed him. We don’t know if it was our side or theirs. But Kotov was blown. That’s why we had to get him out ASAP. The FSB was waiting for him in Tallinn. So was Lennon.”
“But Kotov couldn’t just disappear,” Bourne said. “He had to die.”
“Of course he had to die,” Holly snapped sourly, with impatience in her voice. “Given that we didn’t know who burned him, we needed to keep the security net incredibly tight. Plus, having Kotov ‘dead’ was an advantage in many ways. He could work with us behind the scenes without any worry that he’d be discovered. Clark and I spent more than two years with Grigori creating a strategy. We would have preferred to roll it out earlier, but the political climate wasn’t right until this year. So we began to seed a resistance movement in Moscow, organizing and funding wide-scale protests. Assaults on infrastructure. We wanted it to look like Putin was losing his grip on order and control. That’s the first crack in the armor. We combined that with the sanctions program to put the squeeze on the oligarchs. The goal was to make the Russian people and the elites impatient for change.”
“At which point, Kotov suddenly comes back to life like a phoenix,” Bourne concluded. “He holds a press conference with members of the oligarchs and the siloviki. Announces a leadership challenge to Putin. Leads a call for new elections. Suddenly the U.S. has an ally in charge at the Kremlin.”
“Exactly. Sorokin was the first domino we wanted to fall. He was a young up-and-coming force among the oligarchs. If we could get him on board, then we could begin leveraging the others.”
“Instead he’s dead,” Nova said. “And so is Cafferty, most likely. Lennon blew up your plan like he blew up that ferry.”
Holly frowned. “Yes.”
“Does Tati know her father is alive?” Bourne asked.
“No. She has no idea. We didn’t think it would be safe for her or for Grigori if she knew the truth. The risk was too great that she’d let it slip somehow. Clark was going to tell her today.”
“Where is Kotov?” Bourne asked.
“We’ve had him in an isolated compound in Calif
ornia ever since the extraction.”
“That’s where Nash is now?” Bourne asked.
“Yes. Dixon and I needed to be here for the meeting between Cafferty and Sorokin, but we needed to bring Kotov into the loop, too. So I wanted Nash on the ground to facilitate that conversation.”
“Kotov’s location in California. Does Cafferty know where it is?”
Holly shook her head. “The exact site? No. He knows it’s in the northern part of the state, but that’s all. Anyone who goes there is kept in the dark during transport. So that’s one bright spot. Even assuming he tortures Clark for information, Lennon won’t find out where Kotov is.”
“Not yet.”
“That’s why it’s imperative for us to locate Tati before Lennon does,” Holly insisted. “If Lennon captures Kotov’s daughter, he has unbelievable leverage to draw Kotov out of hiding. Or he can neutralize Kotov by letting him know that any moves he makes against Putin will result in his daughter’s death. If Kotov knows he’s putting Tati at risk by making a move, then we’re done. He’s a father. He wants his daughter back with him.”
“Well, Tati and Vadik will need to come out of hiding soon,” Bourne said. “They’ll need help getting out of the city.”
“Whose help?”
“Vadik teamed up with the Gaia Crusade on Sorokin. Odds are, he’ll go to them first.”
“So what do you suggest?” Holly asked.
Bourne stared at Nova, who nodded back at him. They were still partners. They could still read each other’s thoughts.
“MI-5 has Ethan Pople in custody,” Bourne said. “He’s the pub manager at the Lonely Shepherd, and he’s part of the Gaia Crusade. Ask MI-5 to let him go. Then we follow him and see if he leads us to Vadik.”
23
Vadik and Tati huddled in the back of a lorry in an underground car park near Smithfield Market. The metal of the truck bed felt cold beneath them. They’d been here for hours, long enough that Vadik’s legs were numb. Their rendezvous with the Gaia Crusade was scheduled for two in the morning, just as the meat and poultry market was opening for business. It was almost time to go.
Fifteen more minutes, and they could escape.
Tati had barely spoken since they’d left the wetland park. He didn’t know if she was angry, or in shock, or both, but she kept a cold silence toward him. She was invisible in the darkness under the tarpaulin that was stretched across the back of the truck, but he could feel her warmth next to him and smell her body. Her breathing was steady. She was awake.
“Soon we can go,” he murmured, trying to reassure her.
She didn’t reply immediately. He put a hand on her face, but she slapped it away.
“Oh, yes?” his wife said bitterly. “We can go? Go where? And then what?”
“I don’t know exactly. The Gaia Crusade will get us out of London. After that, I suppose they’ll put us on a boat, or on a truck through the Channel Tunnel. Once we’re on the European mainland, we have more options.”
“Like what?”
“Maybe new identities.”
“A life in hiding? That’s your big plan? How am I supposed to do my work like that? I’m a scientist. You think I’m going to give all of that up and be a shopgirl?”
His own frustration bubbled over. “I don’t know! You think I know? Right now I’m just trying to keep us alive, Tati. I’m sorry. I fucked up. This wasn’t the plan. Nothing was supposed to go like this.”
Her voice hissed at him from the darkness. “You’re a murderer, Vadik. You shot that poor man.”
“Okay, yes, I did, but he was part of the system, Tati. The system is what we should be fighting. The system is what’s destroying the planet. None of those people are innocent. I thought you’d understand that.”
“Well, I don’t.”
He didn’t know what to say to her, so he said nothing. He checked his phone and felt himself growing anxious as the time drew closer. Tati was right. He was a murderer, and there was no going back from what he’d done. If the British caught him, he’d go to prison. If the Russians caught him, he’d be dead. Everyone was an enemy now.
“You used me, Vadik,” Tati went on. “Is that why you married me? Because of my connections? Because I grew up in my father’s world and knew powerful people in Moscow? You don’t give a shit about me.”
“That’s not true.”
“You used my body for sex and my friends for information. You don’t care about anything else, do you?”
“Tati, you’re wrong. Whatever else I did, I love you.”
“Don’t lie to me. You love your fantasy of saving the world. And that’s all it is. A fantasy. The fact is, you’re just a little boy playing games. You’re not changing anything. I’m the one who’s trying to make a difference. I’m the one doing the real work.”
She was making him angry, but he didn’t have time to argue with her. The only thing that mattered was getting away from London, getting out of the country. He took her wrist and held it in a tight grip even when she squirmed. “Come on. We need to go.”
“Maybe I should just stay here. You go by yourself.”
“You can’t stay. You think they won’t arrest you, too?”
“I didn’t do anything.”
“No one will believe you.”
“Because of you,” she spat at him. “They’ll think I was involved because you were involved.”
“Enough.”
Vadik pushed up the tarpaulin a couple of inches and peered at the underground car park. Not far away, he heard gruff voices and saw men dressed in white smocks heading toward the market. The middle of the night was the busy time, when the butchers prepared their meats. He waited until no one was in sight, and then he threw the tarp back. He helped Tati out of the truck.
She looked different. Less glamorous. After they’d escaped the park, he’d stopped at an H&M near Kensington to find downscale clothes. Now she wore a brown wig and a gray knit jumper and loose jeans that hid her figure, as well as flats that didn’t emphasize her height. She’d wiped all of the makeup off her face. Unless someone looked closely, they wouldn’t realize it was her.
Vadik had changed his appearance, too. He’d bought a baseball cap and wore sunglasses, and he’d exchanged his white sweater for a Chelsea football jersey. Hopefully, that was enough to keep anyone watching on the CCTV cameras from spotting them.
He hustled Tati toward the steps leading to the street. “We can’t be late. Let’s go.”
“How do you know who to look for?”
“He posted in the chat room. He’ll be wearing a camouflage hat.”
“Who is he?”
“I don’t know. Part of the Crusade, that’s all I need to know.”
“Do you trust him?”
“We don’t have a choice, Tati. We have to get out of London.”
The two of them emerged on the north end of a circular rotunda over the car park. Vadik stayed near a brick wall by the steps as he surveyed the area. They were across from the Victorian market building with its low red walls and curved archways glowing with stained glass. A dark tunnel, lined with iron grillwork painted in purple and green, led toward the long stalls selling cuts of fresh meat. He could smell the raw blood of the animal carcasses. It was a busy, noisy, crowded space, with trucks rumbling back and forth and men shouting to one another.
Tati started toward the market, but Vadik held her back. “Wait. Not yet.”
He eyed the faces passing in and out of the streetlights. He watched the parked cars. Across the street were three- and four-story apartment buildings over the street-level pubs, and he checked the windows for anyone in the shadows.
“Okay, let’s go.”
Vadik held Tati’s hand tightly, because she felt like a deer ready to bolt. He guided her toward the market tunnel and checked the street in both direc
tions. Strangers shoved around them. There were white vans everywhere, which made him nervous. It was so easy to mount surveillance from inside those trucks, with MI-5 agents pointing cameras through the windows. Or the FSB could grab them and stuff them in the back before anyone even noticed their abduction. There were police everywhere, too. Their reflective yellow jackets shined under the streetlights. All it would take was for one of them to recognize them. He was sure their photographs had been spread far and wide.
“Keep your head down,” he told Tati. “Don’t let people see your face.”
They entered the tunnel, beneath a roof lined with intricate steel crossbeams. The pavement was wet where it had been hosed down, leaving puddles everywhere. The shops were beginning to open, all of the stalls filled with deep red steaks, cheese wheels and green vegetables, huge red mesh bags of onions, and fresh-baked bread and scones.
“I’m hungry,” Tati said. They hadn’t eaten in hours.
“So get something. Be quick.”
He waited nervously while she went to one of the bakery stalls. From under the brim of his baseball cap, he looked for the man who would get them out of the city. Camouflage hat. Where was the camouflage hat?
Someone from the Gaia Crusade was supposed to be here!
Tati came back, nibbling on a slice of nut bread. She always ate like a bird, which kept her skinny. She offered him some, but he shook his head. His own stomach grumbled with hunger, but he was too keyed up to eat anything. Plus he was beginning to get a bad feeling. He was in the right place at the right time, but there was no sign of his contact. Something was wrong.
Maybe they’d cut him loose.
Or maybe they’d turned him in. Give MI-5 one of the wetland assassins and take the heat off the rest of the group.
“Vadik,” Tati murmured, her mouth full.
He twitched impatiently. “What is it?”
“That man over there. He’s got the kind of hat you were looking for.”
Vadik’s head twisted around. He followed Tati’s gaze through the crowd, past the butchers in their smocks, past the police, past the early-morning buyers filling orders for the London restaurants. Near one of the poultry stalls on the far side of the market, a man lingered over the plucked ducks hanging by their feet. He was short, with messy brown hair, and he had his hands in the pockets of a zipped blue windbreaker. He wore a camouflage beanie cap pulled down practically to his eyebrows. The man kept looking around the market.
The Bourne Treachery Page 18