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Ice handed the gun back to Moses.
Moses looked at him funny. “You sure? Don’t know what your objective with this O’Donnell woman is, but you might need it. After all, she’s packing a standard-issue Glock 19. Shoulder holster.”
Ice frowned, rubbed his jaw. He’d shaved before breakfast with Benson, but now it was a day later and he had some stubble. “You didn’t disarm her before putting her in there?”
“Nobody said shit about disarming anyone,” Moses snapped. “Don’t even know why Kaiser wanted me to bring her here. All he said was to keep it quiet, to make sure nobody in the Embassy knew about this.”
Now Ice stepped away from the car door, rubbed the back of his head, straightened his shades, exhaled hard. He thought for a long moment, considered the situation.
Benson was obviously up to something sketchy, but although the rest of the Darkwater guys had warned Ice about Benson’s games, they’d also made it damn clear the guy could be trusted implicitly, that the secret to working with Benson was to roll with the punches, flow with the current, go with the grain.
It had sounded borderline hokey to Ice, but at the same time he sort of understood. It wasn’t a logical kind of understanding, though. More instinctual, gut feeling instead of cold calculation.
Still, Ice did the cold calculation just to be sure he was making the right choice.
And the math was pretty damn simple.
He had two options.
Go forward or turn back.
Call Benson and quit or go forth and conquer.
Ice rubbed the back of his neck again.
Then he stepped away from Moses, let the man close his car door, then watched Moses back the Range Rover out into the dirty street and gun the engine like he was desperate to end his role in this story.
Now Ice stood alone outside that safe-house, the half-open metal door grinning at him like a hyena, beckoning him like a trap, inviting him to step past the threshold and face what lay inside, what lay beyond, what lay within.
A trained, armed, potentially treacherous, probably dangerous CIA agent who might have every incentive to blow his damn head off if Ice walked in there like an action hero.
But still that instinct urged him onwards.
That instinct which felt like something new to Ice, a different sort of gut-feel from the usual battlefield sixth sense that all Special Forces men were blessed with.
Yeah, this instinct was different, and if Ice were truly his parents’ son he might call that instinct the feeling of fate, the drag of destiny, the urging of the universe to take that step forward, to open that door, cross that threshold, face what was waiting within, waiting beyond, waiting inside.
2
Inside the safe-house Indy O’Donnell looked at her watch. She had been waiting six minutes and thirty-eight seconds for Moses to return. She was slightly jumpy, but mostly because it was exciting to be out in the field on what felt like a real assignment, a welcome change from the staid analytical and political work she did for Langley under her cover at the Mumbai Embassy.
Indy surveyed the unpainted concrete walls of the cramped safe-house. The place was bare like Old Mother Hubbard’s cupboard. A steel table and steel chairs for furniture. Naked LED bulbs behind metal cages on every wall, casting the interior in harsh white light that made her temples throb. The windows were frosted glass painted black and bolted shut.
She didn’t think they were bulletproof. This wasn’t a war zone.
A lonely metal cabinet stood against the back wall. It was unlocked, but Indy had no desire to peek inside. Judging by the dust and rodent-pellets on the unevenly tiled floor, this place was mostly a safe-house for cockroaches and rats rather than humans.
Not surprising, Indy thought as she paced the tiled floor in her canvas Vans lace-ups. She couldn’t imagine that guy Moses needing to use this place much. The Indians and the Americans were mostly on good terms. Not good enough for the Indians to allow an official CIA field station in their country, but India was an important ally because of its shared border with China.
Indy took a long breath, smiling as she exhaled the musty air that was just about tolerable thanks to the wheezing air-conditioner on the side wall. Everything about this city was gritty and dirty, and Indy loved it.
She loved being in this part of the world, had literally danced around her Arlington apartment when Langley had approved her application to be stationed in her namesake country of India.
She’d been drawn to this land since the very beginning. At first she’d assumed it was because of her name and her half-ethnicity. But the truth was she’d never really been called the name her father had supposedly given her before he died. Her adoptive parents had called her Indy, like maybe they didn’t love her given name but didn’t want to change it out of respect for a dead man’s wish.
So she’d been Indy, not India.
Indy in her thoughts.